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A SKETCH 



OF THE 



i j&nUUt», Btlatfonsi, snti Statistics, 

V OF THE 

^ WESTERN WORLD, 

J ^ AJVD OF THOSE 

Vi cv CHARACTERISTICS 

OF 

EUROPxsAiir poiiscir 

WHICH MOST IMMEDIATELY AFFECT ITS INTERESTS : 




INTENDED TO 
DEMONSTRATE THE NECESSITY OF 






■^ CONFEDERATION AND ALLIANCE. 






Jam fides, et pax, et honor, pudorque 
5; Piiscus, et neglecta rediie virtus 

Audet, apparetque beata plena 
Copia corau. 

HOR. CARM. SEC. 



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(i/^^y i /6-^l^H-/^' C'^ A^'H't>—~~^^ 



PUBLISHED BY ROBERT H. SMALL, 

No. 165, CHESNUT STREET, 



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9 

Eastern District of Pennsylvania, to wit: * ., 

BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the eleventh day of July in the fifty- 
second jear of the independence of the United Stales of America, A.D. 182T7 
Robert H. Small of the said district hath deposited in this oflSce the titl;^-' 
of a hook, the right whereof he claims as proprietor, in the words following 
to wit : 

" A sketch of the politics, relations, and statistics, of the western worliji 
and of those characteristics of European policy which most immediately 
affect its interests : intended to demonstrate the necessity of a grand Ame- 
rican confederation and alliance. 

Jam fides, et pas, et honor, pudorque 
Priscus, et neglecta redire virtus 

Audet, apparetque beata plena .^ 

Copia cornu. 

Hor. Cairo. Sec." 

In conformity to the act of the Congress of the United States, entitJed, 
" An act for the encouragement of learning, by securing the copies of maps, 
chaits, and books to the authors and proprietors of such copies duiing the 
times therein mentioned ;" and also to the act, entitled " An act supplemen- 
tary to an act, entitled, ' An act for the encouragement of learning, by 
securing the copies of maps, charts, and books, to the authors and pro- 
prietors of such copies during the times therein mentioned,' and extending 
the benefits thereof to the arts of designing, engraving, and etching historical 
and other prints." 

D. CALDWELL, 

Clerk of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. 



;. ^^' 







James Kay, Jun. Printer, 

S. E. Corner of Race ^ Sixth Street^,^ 

Philadelphia. 



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T 



HE writer has used the first person in the ensuing pages 
when speaking from himself, and the offensive monosyllable 
/occurs too often. He has intended to avoid the confusion 
which would have been produced by using the plural, as in 
most writings; we is almost invariably used as signifying 
the inhabitants of the United States. The expressions, " I 
think" and " I believe," are frequent, because his first object 
is to shun every appearance of dictation or of peremptory 
assertion, deeming it much more modest as well as positively 
just, to recognize upon every occasion the absolute right that 
all his fellow citizens, and whoever may read the production, 
have to form their own opinions, and to entertain their own 
sentiments, however antipode to the positions which he 
advances. 

The publication of the work has been retarded by acci- 
dents unlooked for and uncontrollable by the writer. Dur- 
ing the interval between the composition and its going to 
press, the ponderous engine of politics has moved forward, 
the world, and inexorable time, have rolled on in their course. 
It follows that some of the opinions here laid down have 
been verified, and others have apparently been invalidated; 
but, in the author's view, only apparently, not really : ac- 
cording to his manner of considering the subjects, these 



seeming deviations from the general march of the events 
anticipated have been only fortuitous aberrations, and have 
not affected the fundamental calculations of the orbits, in 
which the great bodies of the political firmament are ex- 
pected to revolve. Therefore the ensuing pages are given 
as they were written ; futurity alone can decide whether 
the speculations they contain are mere dreams, or cool and 
well digested propositions. The author considers the com- 
motions which have taken place in several of the South Ame- 
rican nations, and the open war waged between two of them, 
as affording the strongest demonstration of the truth of his 
position, that the general confederation of all America is 
imperiously demanded by the interest of the continent, for 
sake of the peace and happiness of its inhabitants, and as the 
only sure means of preserving general tranquillity, by re- 
pressing with tiie overwhelming power of the confederation 
intestine or international hostilities. Nor does he suppress 
the following arguments on account of the lateness of the 
period at which they are issued ; the congress of Tacu- 
baya had not commenced its sessions at the latest dates : 
and even although it should hav^f terminated infructuously, 
he would still advocate the cause, and would persevere in 
intreating his own country to renew the invitation to the 
other nations of the continent to unite in an alliance which 
appears to his humble conceptions to be the most stupen- 
dous creation of human intellect. 

Philadelphia, June 1827. 



I 



NTEREST, or Glory, has been the object of every ra- 
tional operation of every people, since men first incorporated 
themselves into societies ; or in other words, since there 
were two human beings upon earth. — These objects are in 
fact only one ; because glory is the grandest and most per- 
fect interest; and nothing can be the true and permanent 
interest of a country whi^ S derogates from its glory. 

If the arguments in the following pages shall demonstrate 
that glory allures us with imperishable wreaths of laurel and 
of oak leaf, and that interest tempts us with hoards of gold, 
to adopt the measures which it is the business of this publi- 
cation to advocate, — if it be shewn that every fundamental 
principle which can actuate the conduct of a nation, enjoins 
upon the United States to take the position here recommend- 
ed — if these things can be proved, then will the doctrines 
advanced be the echoes cT political commandments. 

Can I hope to carry conviction in the arguments accumu- 
lated by efforts of my feeble pen *? — I dare not. — Truth, how- 
ever, is mighty and must prevail. I believe the ground taken 
is true, and that it is only necessary to expose the truth, in 
order to convince an intelligent people. If I am wrong, it is 
my great misfortune : but, entertaining my present impres- 
B 



sions, I feel that I should fail in the duty which every mem- 
ber of society owes to his country, and should be wanting 
to myself as interested equally with every other citizen in 
the welfare of our common mother, if I did not endeavour to 
open the eyes of the community to what I consider dictated 
by all the motives which can influence a government or a 
people. Under these impressions I write, and for business, 
not style. To my motives, and chief of them to the love of 
my natal soil, which impells me to encounter much party pre- 
judice and great diversity of opinion, and to the indulgence 
of my fellow citizens, I trust for the reception of this essay, 
without an expectation that the manner of executing the task 
will recommend it to the public. 



■*!f^^^fi^ 



CHAPTER I. 



JLN order to enter upon our subject fully prepared, it is 
necessary to take a view of the actual situation of such parts 
of the world as are directly concerned in the interests and 
matters we are about to consider, and of the probable results 
from existing political circumstances connected with Ame- 
rican affairs. 

I shall attempt this in the following rapid sketch : pro- 
testing at the same time against our assumption of the 
smallest right to interfere in the concerns of other natioris, 
and reciprocally against their having any right to meddle with 
ours. The design of a Grand American Confederacy 
does not contradict this principle ; it is most emphatically 
our business, and moreover, our attention to it has been 
invited by the other nations of this continent. It is no bu- 
siness of ours what policy other nations think proper to 
adopt, provided it does not operate upon us; and still less 



does it concern us what domestic arrangements they choose 
to make, or what forms of government they choose to retain. 
We have nothing to do with these things. No government 
can exist contrary to the will of the great majority of the 
people ; and that majority has the exclusive right to decide 
upon the point. It is in vain to talk of military force keep- 
ing down the majority of a people ; this is the pretext of 
those who are disposed to submit ; the numbers would be too 
enormously disproportionate, if the people were to resist 
it; the military would be a feather in the scale, they never 
could compose the tithe of the population, and the body of 
the soldiery is taken from the mass of the people, only the 
officers being of the privileged class. I think so well of the 
strength of the great mass of the population in any country 
as to believe that the government could not exist for an hour 
after the body of the people should be so far disgusted with 
it as to overcome the natural disposition for quiet, and the 
equally natural indisposition to disturb the existing order of 
things. Therefore all subsisting governments have the sanc- 
tion of the approbation of the majority of those who recog- 
nize them, and on our own principles we have no right to 
interfere. These positions are so true that I challenge all 
history for a single example of successful insurrection which 
was not instigated by a member or members of what is called 
the higher order of society, or of that class which has 
influence enough to excite the body of the people. I do 
not mean that the originators of insurrections have always 
been titled noblemen; but even Spartacus, slave as he was 
in Rome, is recorded to have been a noble Scythian, and 
evidently had high mental powers, or at least great know- 
ledge of war ; but I mean that the chiefs in civil disturbances 
which have obtained their purposes have invariably been 
men of talent, of superior acquirements, of high conside- 
ration among the people, and have, with very few exceptions, 
belonged to the privileged class, to which the people were 
accustomed to look up, when there was such a class in their 
country. 

We claim for ourselves the right of deciding upon our 
form of government, and of regulating our internal affairs 



as we please; and on our own principles again, we have no 
right to dictate to other nations upon these points : if we 
have the right, they have it equally ; and from its exercise 
would ensue perpetual hostilities, in which force and chance 
would determine the party whose opinions should give the 
law to the rest. There is no exception to the general rule, 
but the single case when the form of government or the dis- 
sensions among a neighbouring people affect the tranquil- 
lity of a nation; then the molested nation has the same 
right to insist upon a change, or to enter and force it, that an 
individual has to force a neighbour to extinguish a fire in his 
premises which threatens to destroy the adjacent property. 
It is not my intention therefore to discuss any policy of 
other nations which does not directly bear upon our interests, 
or which they have not intrusively pressed, officially, or by 
their popular clamour, upon us for our adoption. 



CHAPTER II. 



E 



NGLAND has prohibited the slave trade to her sub- 
jects, after having fully stocked her own colonies, and thereby 
created a production in her West Indian possessions, ex- 
ceeding her demand for it so much that she is obliged to 
resort to various expedients to keep out of her home market 
any kind of competition in the different articles which their 
climate and soil afford. But she is not contented with hav- 
ing prohibited the importation into her own colonies after 
their being fully supplied, as she had a perfect right to do; 
she now goes about canting and preaching to all other na- 
tions, telling them what a burning shame it is to traffic in 
slaves, and to hold any human beings in bondage. This she 
has no right to do : she regulated her own dominions, and 



9 

no body ought to dispute her authority there ; but every one 
must dispute her the privilege of interfering with the ar- 
rangements of others. She talks of her glory being con- 
cerned in it. What has the rest of the world to do with her 
glory *? Besides it certainly consists at least as much with 
her interest as with her reputation, now that she has as many 
slaves as she can work, to exhort the Africans, who do not 
thank her for her interference, and who continue the traffic 
in spite of her entreaties and of the force which she applies 
to repress it, and to lecture the governments of Europe and 
America upon the enormity of dealing in human flesh and of 
retaining the slaves they have in servitude. I must not be 
misunderstood as advocating that detestable trade ; but I 
insist that each nation has a right to judge upon it, and on 
all other subjects, according to its own sense of morality, and 
that it is an impertinence in any nation to read homilies to 
the rest : such homilies come with a very bad grace from Eng- 
land, the largest slave holder on earth ; it savours of the ridi- 
culous to suppose mankind such gulls as to listen to her 
representations, when they know that she did not cease to im- 
port negroes into her colonies until they were overflowing, and 
that she holds them as inflexibly as any other nation, whose 
negro slaves by the bye are now exactly in the same condi- 
tion as the bulk of her own immediate population was only 
a very few centuries since, working for their masters five or 
six days in the week, and having the other one or two (lays 
for themselves; with these differences only, that the English 
slave was neither fed nor clothed by his lord who possessed 
the power of life and death over him, and exercised it not 
very sparingly, if her history is correct. 

With all these reasons for her taking the beam out of her 
own eye before she meddled with the motes in the eyes of 
her neighbours, England has gone through the world, her 
" saints^^ threatening present and future punishment, and her 
statesmen negociating against slavery; she has induced 
some powers to assent to her proposition for search and for 
the mixed commission, by which the claims she sets up for 
searching vessels during war — a pretence which never would 
be acceded to by any nation able to resist her force — will 



10 

be established directly or indirectly in peace also, if they 
are ever sanctioned; or at least they will be brought forward 
by her upon all occasions as a precedent. She has not 
hesitated to accuse the United States, in decent terms by 
her diplomacy, but in pretty unrestrained language by her 
presses, of a disposition to oppose the suppression of the 
slave trade. 

Now whatever credit is attached to national exertions for 
suppression of this traffic belongs of right to us; because 
we were the first nation which passed laws interdicting it to 
our citizens, the only persons whom we had a right to inter- 
fere with in the matter, as her own subjects were the only 
persons whose conduct England had a right to regulate : 
we were also the first nation to declare the slave trade 
piracy in our citizens. England, taking up the thing after 
we did, exhibits a disposition, and has had some success in 
the attempt, to push us out of our precedence in so laudable 
a career, to deprive us of the reputation attendant upon such 
precedence, and to induce the world to consider her as the 
great champion in the cause ; in order to effect these objects, 
she clamours about it loudly, and burthens her diplomacy 
with expedients for usurping or for inducing concessions 
from other nations of utter novelties in national law, and of 
points which no governments can abandon without relin- 
quishing, in some measure, to a foreign sovereignty, their 
own independence. She interferes with us in our rightful 
claim upon the commendation of the world for commencing 
an opposition to the trade and for giving an example, as well 
as for persevering in wise and just measures to suppress it; 
measures equally correct in themselves and respectful to the 
privileges of the other members of the great political society 
of the world. She does this by operations indefensible in 
themselves, which never could be tolerated if they were not 
enveloped in appeals to the humanity and the best feelings 
of our nature. 

But what is her object, or at any rate what will be the 
result of her course /? Her West Indian islands and her East 
Indian possessions do or can produce almost all the staples 
which form the wealth and the commercial advantages of 



11 

South America and of our own southern states ; rice, indigo, 
cotton, coffee, sugar, dye woods, incorruptible timber for 
ornament or ship building, chocolate, cochineal, precious 
stones, and a vast variety of other articles, are produced or 
can be cultivated in those islands or in her vast dominions in 
the east, as well as in those countries which enjoy a similar 
climate and soil. Her own islands, as we have before said, 
are fully stocked with hands, and her East Indian territories 
abound in population; she has moved heaven and earth to 
prevent the other nations which own West Indian islands 
from acquiring additional labour of the only kind that is 
adapted to the climate ; and they, not having pursued the 
same plan as herself, of replenishing the islands with hands, 
will not be able to compete with hers in raising the same 
productions. — By these means she infallibly must acquire a 
monopoly of the articles produced in the West Indies, all 
the result of her operations relative to the slave trade. 

But it will be said the southern part of North America, 
and all South America, will still enter into competition with 
her in these articles — my answer is deduced from what fol- 
lows. 

England has been for centuries engaged in creating ma- 
nufactures of every kind in her bosom; she has laboured 
assiduously, and by dint of bounties, prohibitions, restric- 
tions, rewards, and penalties, she has succeeded in creating 
capital, knowledge, skill, artizans, labourers, machinery, and 
productiveness, unexampled in the annals of history: her 
system was a model of wisdom on the subject, for she has 
elevated all her manufactures together, giving bounties to 
each as it was invented or introduced, witness the silk, glass, 
&c. &c. : she has formed an agriculture capable of feeding 
her population in ordinary seasons, of supplying them with 
many materials for their manufactures, such as wool, flax, 
&c. &c. &c. ; and she takes from her own soil most of the 
metals and minerals they require, she takes them at small 
cost in consequence of the immense improvement her sys- 
tem has produced in all sorts of machinery. To give only 
a single item of the enormous power of production that she 
possesses, her steam machinery is estimated at the power of 



12 

200,000,000 men : other details are found in most books 
of reference, and are well known to those who take the trou- 
ble to read these pages, or may be known with little trouble 
to any person who will examine the subject : general, and 
well known results are all that are required to support my 
positions. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that England 
can clothe all Europe and America, and furnish them vyith 
nearly every article of manufacture, by only putting her pre- 
sent establishments into activity With this capability of 
underselling all nations even in their own markets, unless 
she is kept out of them by commercial regulations and du- 
ties, the consequence of her hitherto inflexible system, she 
now comes before the world with declarations of the injus- 
tice of restraining commerce, with arguments to prove how 
erroneous are all kinds of regulating duties, and with exhor- 
tations to join with her in rendering commerce perfectly free 
by striking off from it every shackle and every impediment. 
She also urges the abolition of all discriminating duties upon 
shipping, while she has 2,542,000 tons of commercial sea 
vessels, being nearly double of the tonnage belonging to any 
other country*. — That is, now that she is ripe for the mea- 
sure, now that she is able to undersell and undernavigate 
(if I may be allowed the expression) every body else, and to 
flood every market with her staples, she proposes to them 
to submit to these new doctrines and their consequences; 
while they cannot introduce a half dozen articles into h^r 
ports at prices which would allow them to compete with 
what she produces ; it being recollected that a necessary 
consequence of such a free trade (if she ever permits it in her 
own case for her domestic consumption) will be the release 
from excise of the commodities liable to be affected. Now 
this is so barefaced an attempt at imposition, that it can 
hardly be possible the rest of the world will be duped by the 
plausible arguments she uses to persuade people out of their 
senses. If she could succeed, she would be able to bring 



* See Huskisson's speech of the 12th of May 1826, referring to official reports 
of the 25th of December 1825. He gives the number of sea vessels at same date 
as 24,174. These sums do not include the military marine. 



17 



CHAPTER III. 



Ti 



HE next power whose state I shall consider is France- 
" Beautiful France" is next to England in commerce and 
manufactures; in every thing else that can make a nation 
rich and glorious she is far before her rival. She stands 
at this moment renewing her enormous strength, and in- 
creasing it by vast additions, occupied almost solely in these 
patriotic pursuits, and in reconciling herself to the rest of 
Europe, after the misfortunes of her revolution, at which 
none is more shocked than herself; after her triumphant and 
magnificent career under the consular and imperial regimes, 
when in the intoxication of success she too much disregard- 
ed the pride and the feelings of other nations, not to pro- 
voke a general array against her of those who suffered 
reluctantly the weight of her sceptre, which was of iron 
although gilded; and after the exhaustion nearly of thirty 
years' war, which, however successful, nevertheless drained 
her of men, and subjected her to various internal restrictions, 
in spite of the wisdom which fostered with parental care 
every species of industry, and called forth by wealth, honours, 
and by every inducement which could rouse the faculties of 
the mind, all the talents of human intellect, in order to pro- 
mote the prosperity of the French people. Having expe- 
rienced the recoil of her own artillery, and having been over 
powered, not ingloriously, by the concentrated force of a 
whole continent, she has been obliged during eleven years 
to aim at conciliating those whom previously she either sub- 



18 

dued or attacked; she has been obliged by every dictate of 
policy and common sense to reconcile herself to Europe and 
to the world. With these views, while her manufactures have 
gone on increasing, supported by an excellent agriculture, 
prolific in every means of enjoyment and wealth, while her 
exhausted marine, commercial and military, is recovering the 
position to which it is entitled by her innumerable staples, 
her vast resources, and her important station in the political 
world, — while every domestic advantage has been sedulously 
cherished and every thing has prospered with her, she has 
watched the phases of politics, and her acute and skilful ne- 
gociators have appeared, openly or inofficially, in every 
bureau where politics were discussed. France is pecu- 
liarly circumstanced ; indeed her situation is a perfect ano- 
maly in history. She is very rich, very strong in resources, 
her finances are the best conditioned in Europe, she is brave 
enough to do any thing, she is pretty well governed, and 
she is upon good terms with her neighbours; and yet she 
is obliged to resort to many expedients, and to observe 
the utmost caution in order to persuade the world, and even 
herself, that she has forgotten the roads to the capitals of the 
other members of the European family, and has also forgot- 
ten that they all found the way to Paris — facts which neither 
they nor she can really forget, but of which, on all sides, they 
endeavour to conceal their recollection by excessive civility, 
proper and necessary to all. It is therefore a fortunate thing 
for France, as matters did take the turn which we have wit- 
nessed, that Napoleon was a victim upon whom her offences 
against the rest of Europe might be visited, and upon whom 
the animosity of those whom her power oppressed might be, 
and has been, concentrated. I say this without in the least 
changing my opinion of that great man; indeed the wish he 
expressed that his sacrifice might be of benefit to France and 
reconcile her to Europe, seems to be satisfied; without some 
definite object whereupon to concentrate the feelings of Eu- 
rope, she would have continued for more than one gene- 
ration to be as much hated by her neighbours as she was 
envied by them in the day of her ascendancy. Her pre- 



19 

sent sovereign appears to be a good man, and well advised j 
and after all it is the chief merit of a monarch to have the 
tact for choosing able counsellors, and the good sense to take 
their advice, whether he be endowed with great talents him- 
self or not. He is somewhat bound up however in his fo- 
reign relations, by the consciousness that he is indebted, for 
the restoration of the crown to his race, to the other sove- 
reigns of the continent, and by his family connections with 
several of them : the latter sentiment is particularly manifest 
in his conduct with regard to South America; for it is 
most evident that nothing can be more beneficial to France 
in her manufacturing and commercial relations than the 
liberation of the cidevant Spanish colonies, and the opening 
of those ports so long almost hermetically sealed ; most of 
her manufactures are particularly adapted to the taste and 
inclinations of the Hispano- Americans, and their productions 
are peculiarly acceptable to the French population. In 
spite of these inducements for her recognition of their inde- 
pendence, the king has not yet been able to take a step so 
obnoxious to his cousin of Spain ; and has therefore been 
compelled to pursue an intermediate and equivocal course, 
not satisfactory to either party, and which may possibly ter- 
minate in the loss of nearly all commercial intercourse with 
South America, possibly by making France tributary to Eng- 
land for the South American productions, and thus by mak- 
ing her contribute, however unwillingly, to the advancement 
and to the establishment of the English system. This, it 
may be urged, will be changed in the course of a few years : 
but I answer (and I shall have to repeat and expatiate fur- 
ther upon it hereafter), commerce does not so readily, as 
has been pretended, obey the lead of its interest and seek 
the connections which are most to its real advantage ; affec- 
tion or inclination go for a great deal in deciding the course 
of commerce ; and when it has taken a specific channel, 
formed its credits, acquaintances, and correspondences, it is 
diverted from its accustomed route with great reluctance and 
great difficulty. Therefore when England shall have se- 
cured the good will of the South Americans by her political 
course, purchased it by lavish expenditure of money in va- 



^ 20 

rious shapes, among which are her great loans to the govern- 
ments and to individuals, fixed her influence by means of 
the settlement of numbers of her subjects in the mining and 
other establishments, and arranged correspondences which 
will require only a letter to supply goods of any description ; 
when all these operations, daily going on, are completed, 
France will find it next to an impossibility to acquire the 
footing and commerce with the South Americans, which at 
this instant are perfectly within her power. 

Thus will the present ostensible policy of France injure 
herself and promote the designs of her great rival. But if she 
should change it, and come forward at the congress of Tacu- 
baya, as is not improbable, with a frank and open recogni- 
tion of the independence of the southern continent, then, 
unless the United States shall adopt the policy which ap- 
pears to be called for by every dictate of expediency, France 
will be another obstacle to our interests. 



CHAPTER IV. 



S. 



'PAIN has not a marine, nor enterprize, nor manufac- 
tures, nor capital, to enter into the contest for the commerce 
of South America with the two above mentioned powers, 
or with ourselves : she has also so bitterly exasperated the 
people formerly attached to her, by her inexorable policy, 
and by the relentless and sanguinary warfare which she has 
carried on against them, that they are forever alienated 
from her in feeling as much as they are by their polities. If 
Spain had conducted this war with only ordinary humanity, 
if she had even made war as England did upon us during 
our revolutionary contest, though that was bad enough, she 
would have regained a portion of kindly feeling toward^ her 



13 

into every market, besides her own manufactures, all the sta- 
ples of the East and of the West Indies, at lower prices than 
any other power could afford to supply them, thus securing to 
herself an absolute monopoly of manufactures and of every 
species of commerce, carrying trade and all — and yet there 
are some persons in the United States who advocate our 
subscribing to the new doctrines. 

Nevertheless there are some countries, particularly of 
South America, which abound in raw materials, and which 
want manufactured articles, not having yet created establish- 
ments to answer the demand, where the new doctrines may 
be acceded to at present : they will see their error, and will 
change their system ; but nations are slow in making such 
changes, because many interests are involved in support- 
ing the actual state of things ; and therefore fifty or more 
years may elapse, as they have done here, before the neces- 
sary alteiations are made : meanwhilp. other commercial or 
manufacturing nations lose all the profits of their commerce, 
and England reaps all the fruits. 

If England can persuade the South American states to 
adopt her new system, she secures their markets for her ma- 
nufactures : she does more ; they have very few ships, and 
on the Atlantic if not on the Pacific coast are essentially 
indisposed to maritime operations ; it will require at least 
another generation to alter their temper in this respect; 
she therefore will secure their carrying trade, and her ma- 
nufactures will purchase their produce. How will she stand 
then'? We have shewn that, by her ex post facto cant 
about slavery, she is enabled to afford the West Indian pro- 
ductions cheaper than any other power, she can throw into 
Europe, or wherever there is a demand, unlimited quantities 
of colonial produce from her East Indian possessions; that she 
may command absolutely the South American trade, and 
thus she will be the factor and the carrier of every article of 
the sort, and will enjoy an unrestricted monopoly of them. 

Such are the two leading points of the present English 
policy, and such will be the results of her success, if she is 
able to accomplish her designs. With these views, con- 
ceived in the maturest reflection, she has poured out blood 
C 



14 

and treasure to gain an influence in South America, and 
with these views is she labouring to form treaties there, be- 
sieging every one of their governments with her agents, to 
negociate or to intrigue. It is true that these projects will 
be resisted, but I do not see how they are to be resisted 
effectually with regard to colonial produce, if England gets 
command of the South American market, as she will do if 
she is not met by the system which it is the object of these 
sheets to advocate, because it is a fact, which is not worth 
while to conceal, that she can navigate cheaper than any 
other power. Obsta principiis, is a maxim that will en- 
dure for ever; if England is not resisted in her first attempts, 
the introduction of her whole plan can hardly be prevented. 
We have seen that the guarda costas of Spain could not keep 
her manufactures out of South America formerly, nor secure 
to the mother country the monopoly to which she pretended, 
and to which the then excellfincp of her chief fabrics entitled 
her — if any thing could give title to such a monopoly, which 
I am not going to concede. We have seen that the splendid 
and mighty power of Napoleon in vain drove English com- 
merce and English productions from Europe; they returned 
by a thousand indirect means — they insinuated themselves 
even into France by a thousand obscure filtrations. We 
have seen that marks, and stamps, and signatures, of our 
own manufacturers cannot keep her goods out of our mar- 
ket, for she does not hesitate to counterfeit them, while she 
punishes with death similar offences against her own people, 
as if moral crime was not the same everywhere. She gains 
access to all countries by the advantage of cheapness, pro- 
fiting of the selfishness which induces men to disregard the 
condition of their countrymen, provided their own wants or 
luxuries are satisfied. She has always complained of the inter- 
dictions and domestic monopolies of other nations as public 
injuries, which she or any other foreign nation had certainly 
no right to complain of, whatever those liable to them might 
have, while she herself has been the most rigorous prohibiter 
and monopolist : she has not hesitated even to go to war or 
to instigate foreign wars, in order to force her productions 
into the markets she desired. All these things had taken 



15 ' 

place before she found herself in a situation to pretend to 
act upon her novel doctrines. If such has been heretofore 
the case, while no one disputed the policy of fostering the 
commerce and manufactures of nations by protecting duties 
and interdictions, what may we not expect when an acute 
people and an interest, powerful from the influence of wealth 
as well as from many other considerations, now advocate, 
with all the force of logic, negociation, temptations, and in- 
ducements, the adoption of a system not more clearly oppo- 
site to the real interest of the rest of the world than the 
course which she formerly pursued. 

It is not an objection to my argument to say, that she has 
not yet acted upon her new system* with respect to her own 
dominions: I do not believe that she ever will herself adopt 
it in extenso; she will always persevere in her old plan of 
protecting such of her manufactures, and such parts of her 
commerce, as require nursing : but she argues vehemently 
with all other nations upon the impropriety of their pursu- 
ing the same course ; and if, in order to induce them to come 
into her views, she should offer to put them upon a footing 
of perfect equality and of unrestricted commerce with her- 
self, it would be a mere deception ; because to place them 
upon a real equality, she must divide with them equally 
her capital, her mechanics, her mechanical habits, pro- 
pensities, and information, results of the education and cus- 
toms of ages; and she must share with them her vast ship- 
ping, her sailors, and her maritime disposition. This is 
impossible ; therefore it is also impossible that any bargain 
based upon abolitioit of discriminating duties or free impor- 
tation can be otherwise than to her advantage, and to the 
injury of every one else. 

Nor are the consequences of her plans favourable to the 
happiness of the human race, or to the general improvement of 
mankind; it tends directly to drive men back into barbarism : 



* It is a new system in English politics. Adam Smith was not an English- 
man ; moreover he was a philosopher, and unfortunately his theory appeared 
a few centuries too late : the diverse tempers of nations or of their rulers had 
already rendered its adoption impossible, without deep injury to the interests and 
welfare of millions ; England exports such theories, she does not use them. 



16 

foreign commerce is necessary to civilization, and manufac- 
tures are necessary to the well being of a country — without 
the former a people must remain stationary, devoid of infor- 
mation relative to the improvements of the rest of the world, 
and all experience shews that a nation without commerce 
sinks into rudeness — to argue about it is in vain; men have 
always done so, and men now are formed of the same mate- 
rials as they have been since the creation, — the same causes 
will therefore produce the same effects. Again, without ma- 
nufactories within her territory a nation is at the mercy of any 
government which chooses to wage war upon her, and the 
population may be reduced, by a simple blockade, to the 
greatest distress for want of articles rendered indispensable 
by actual necessity or by inveterate habit, and even for want 
of weapons of defence ; the experience of our late war ena- 
bles us to speak feelingly upon this subject. The system of 
England goes directly toward constituting her the only com- 
mercial power and the only manufacturer in the world; of 
course to reduce mankind to ignorance, impotency, and bar- 
barism; and she stands by with fallacious arguments, with a 
tremendous armed power, marine and army, sword in hand, 
to enforce conviction and compliance with her views. 

The actual state of England is constituted by many other 
relations, composed of her politics, her ambition for political 
and moral influence, her passions and caprices, as well as the 
dispositions, friendships, affections, prejudices, or personal 
ambition of her rulers : but the systems, or rather the sys- 
tem, (for that first alluded to is only a cardinal and indispen- 
sable part of the grand whole which is developed in the 
second,) is the leading feature in her policy, and that whose 
effects upon the general affairs of the world are the most 
important and the most durable : as such, to it alone I have 
confined my observations ; I have dwelt upon England and 
English policy much more at length than at first view may 
be thought necessary, and more than will be required by the 
consideration of the other powers which will appear in this 
preparatory survey, because her schemes and her system are 
the most threatening to our interests, and the most extensive 
in their bearings and influence. 



21 

and a part of the commerce which she has now lost forever. 
Similarity of language, and some similarity of tastes and ha- 
bits, would have made that commerce a source of more real 
wealth to her than all her monopolies, and her dismes upon 
the precious metals, which have been poured into her for ages 
like water into the sieves of the daughters of Dardanus. Eng- 
land found this to be the case in respect to her commerce with 
us; but Spain, when she has lost portions of her dominions, 
has lost almost all connection with them; thus it was when 
she lost Holland, when she lost Portugal, and when she lost 
Flanders; thus also will it be when her contest with South 
America is determined. That she will clamour against the 
course pursued by the rest of the world is very certain; 
it can be nothing but noise ; she is too much prostrated, too 
much distracted, and too miserable, to have any weight or 
any serious effect upon the affairs of other nations; and 
it will take her more than a century to restore herself to a 
reasonable degree of internal prosperity ; by that time pas- 
sion upon the subject will be obsolete : she has every thing 
to restore, even the agriculture necessary to her subsistence. 



CHAPTER V. 



T 



HE three above named powers are all that are imme- 
diately and importantly concerned in the commercial relations 
which will spring out of the new state of things in America. 
The other powers are however deeply interested ; some of 
them, as Holland, or the new kingdom of the Netherlands, 
will have extensive commerce with South America ; although 
it will be secondary at a long interval to that of France, 
England, or the United States, for the day« when the Dutch 
broom swept the ocean have gone by never to return. Swe- 
D 



22 

den, Denmark, and Russia will also have maritime relations 
with the southern continent. Prussia and Austria have so 
few ports that their maritime commerce will be still lower 
in the scale of importance- Italy, Austrian or other, so sel- 
dom sends her vessels across the Atlantic that we may pass 
her in silence. But all these nations are large consumers 
of the staples which are afforded by South America, such as 
sugar, coffee, cotton, rice, chocolate, dyes, not to mention 
the precious metals, jewels, &c. &c &c. and furnish consi- 
derable supplies of manufactures adapted to that market. 
Most of the American productions have been and will con- 
tinue to be furnished to them through the medium, or by the 
carrying trade of North America, France, and England; 
while their equivalents will be transported by the same 
nations, or will assume the shape of credits upon the ex- 
changes of those powers, and this will be the most common 
form of payment for their importations. They are therefore 
deeply concerned in preventing any one power from mono- 
polizing the South American trade. 



— ee©— 



CHAPTER VI. 



B 



' UT the four great empires of Europe compose the Holy 
Alliance, and are connected with other smaller powers whose 
number and the extent of the connection are unknown in 
this country, unless to the executive, if even it have full in- 
formation on the subject. This alliance may view American 
affairs in a light different from the considerations which have 
been heretofore detailed. The antagonists of the alliance 
charge it with a design for extending the principle of mon- 
archy to countries where that form of government does not 
exist, and for strengthening the principle in those regions 



23 

whefe it is recognized. With the latter design I repeat that 
we have nothing to do ; it is exclusively the affair of those 
nations which are objects of the enterprize ; the homely ad- 
age " let every one mind his own business" can never be 
better applied than to international relations, and it cannot 
be too often repeated in this country. If our institutions are 
undisturbed by other powers, we have no right to meddle 
with theirs. But if the other design be really entertained, it 
is a very different matter ; it would be a direct interference 
with our immediate concerns, and would demand vigorous 
repulsion. For myself however, I do not look upon the Holy 
Alliance as the bugbear which it is generally thought to be 
among us. The people of most of the European dominions 
have grown old under the monarchical form of government, 
their habits, prejudices, and feelings are as much confirmed 
in it as ours are in a republican form of government ; they 
are as happy under their system as any nation can be under 
a different one ; and they would not be happy under ano- 
ther regime opposed to their taste and their modes of think- 
ing : they have as good a right to decide upon this matter as 
we have, and the same argument which forbids their inter- 
ference with us, also forbids us to disturb them — every peo- 
ple has a right to choose its own form of government. If 
the Holy Alliance be a confederation of kings against the 
privileges of the people, I certainly would be the last to 
justify such an object ; all I can say about it is that we have 
nothing to do with it, nor has any one but the parties imme- 
diately interested ; it is preposterous to think of playing 
Peter the hermit in the I9th century and to go crusading 
against persons or principles alien, antipode, to us and ours ; 
but if its object be only to prevent wars, by establishing a 
forum, where, by representation and amicable negociation, 
the disputes which continually arise among nations may be 
decided without cutting some thousand throats and burning 
some hundred villages in order to determine a question nine 
times in ten not worth the trouble and expense of a quarrel, 
then in my opinion the alliance has a meritorious and phi- 
lanthropic object ; and I can not conceive that a number of 
men respectable and honourable in their private characters 



24 

would put their signatures to so many public and solemn 
assurances, if they were a tissue of falsehood, as they would 
be if their objects were diiferent from those last stated. 
However, transactions or politics, purely European or Asiatic 
or African, and principles maintained there, not attempted to 
be disseminated or imposed upon us, but confined to the 
continents separated from us by vast seas, are nothing to us ; 
they are nothing to us as long as they do not trench upon 
our interests. If the people or the sovereignties of the se- 
veral nations are wrong, it is their misfortune, or rather their 
bad luck, for the mass of happiness among them is probably 
as great as it is among ourselves ; and our interference, 
either to persuade them that they are fools or to rise up 
and kill one another, to acquire modes of government and 
fashions of living which they do not like and for which their 
habits, inclinations, and prejudices do not adapt them, — our 
meddling with their domestic aifairs, does not procure us 
their thanks, nor gain proselytes, except among a few un- 
quiet spirits who have nothing to lose, but everything to gain^ 
by civil discord, and such conduct is in direct contradiction 
to the fundamental doctrine and principle of the right of self 
government and of regulating domestic affairs according to 
the will of a nation, which we correctly and generally main- 
tain. We have much to do at home ; quite enough to employ 
all our talents and thoughts, without wasting them in dog- 
matizing to other nations; when we have shewn the thou- 
sands among our population who now inhabit miserable log 
huts how to lodge themselves comfortably and neatly, and to 
add healthful or even luxurious articles to their diet by em- 
ploying a few days of each year in forming gardens, when we 
improve our agricultural habits so that our ground will pro- 
duce four fold the crops now made in many parts of 
the country, when we persuade one third of the agricul- 
turists even to carry out their manure, and to sow grass 
seed, and not to cut down their sugar maple trees, when we 
have created manufactories to supply all our wants, when 
we have facilitated the transportation of the productions of 
different quarters to supply the demands or to be exchanged 
for the superabundance of other quarters, when we have 



placed the means of education within reach of all our citi- 
zens, when we have codified and simplified our laws which 
now threaten with their commentaries in every state to sux- 
pass in bulk the three hundred camel loads which oppressed 
the Romans, when we have perfected our national glory and 
rendered individual happiness the lot of every one of our in- 
habitants by improving all the means which a bountiful 
providence has bestowed upon us in the intelligence of the 
people and in a territory prolific of every thing that can con- 
tribute to the necessities, comfort, or luxury of men ; when 
that blessed period arrives, then, if ever, it will be time to ap- 
ply to the schooling of other nations talents and attention 
which are now much better employed when devoted to the 
service and interests of our own citizens. 

I must not be misunderstood (nor will my words admit 
such a construction which is far from my thoughts) to mean 
to make myself the champion of the Holy Alliance ; if it re- 
quires defence, let those who are interested take up the pen : 
my sole desire is to convince such of my fellow citizent as 
may read these pages that we have no business with it in any 
of its relations which are confined to Europe. 

But we shall have some business with the Holy Alliance, if 
it attempts to extend its views across the Atlantic ; and that 
precisely upon the same principles which lead me to protest 
against our meddling with the internal concerns of Europe. 
Sound policy dictates to us pacific measures of precaution 
against the conception of such a design, and to guard against 
any attempts to carry it into effect. This is the only aspect 
under which the operations of the Holy Alliance can be of any 
consequence to us, beyond the transitory sensation excited 
by history or rumour, and instead of wasting our solicitude 
upoia the effects which this conspiracy of kings, as it is called 
by some persons (although by the bye it is no conspiracy of 
kings at all) had upon the French who are better competent 
to judge for themselves than we are to judge for them, or 
upon the Germans who do not thank us, or upon the Rus- 
sians who do not understand us, or upon the inhabitants of 
terra australis incognita, if there be such a place ; instead 
of interfering with things in which we have no manner of in- 



26 

terest, and which we have no right to meddle with, it is to the 
possible direction of European politics and ambition, that we 
ought to turn our attention, and in so doing we shall not only 
exercise a right, but also perform a duty ; and we shall not 
have to endure that calm indifference to our opinion which 
is provocation for blows, nor that infernal smile which is an 
insult worse than the rape of Helen. We shall be upon ground 
which the world knows, and, what is of infinitely more con- 
sequence, which we feel, is just and tenable; we shall speak 
upon a subject whereupon we are thoroughly informed, to 
those who will hear us and must hear us, and who will not 
have it in their power to consign our writings or sayings to 
the bureaus of the police, or to the ocean by a simple man- 
date to the custom house officers, before they reach the eyes 
or ears of the people ; this is the fate of speculations upon 
the internal policy or the mutual treaties of the European go- 
vernments, in the tirades of some of our politicians, which only 
offend the ruling authorities, whose measures are opposed. 
By expressing our sentiments on every possible interposi- 
tion of Europe in relation to the affairs of America, we 
should treat upon a subject where our opinions would be 
supported by our power to enforce them, and wherein no- 
thing can be done without our concurrence or without our 
having the means of resistance in our own hands. 1 have said 
any possible interposition, but in polities all things which 
are possible are probable ; we should therefore act, not hos- 
tilely, but firmly and decidedly, as if the confederation of 
European sovereigns had an inclination to take part in the 
concerns of the two Americas ; an inclination which our ex- 
perience teaches us to regard as equally probable and autho- 
rized by precedent, for France, Spain, Holland, and Prussia 
took part either directly or indirectly in our revolutionary 
contest with Great Britain ; Russia and France in our late 
war with the same power ; Great Britain by covert measures, 
or at least by wilfully shutting the Argus eyes of her go- 
vernment to the supplies of men, arms, and money for the 
South American war with Spain ; Austria and England in the 
affairs of Brazil with Portugal ; and the presence of several 
agents declared or incognito from European powers at the 



27 

place of meeting of the congress of Panama wore the same 
aspect. We have then great reason to conclude, indepen- 
dently of the vivid interest manifested by the journalists and 
other writers in Europe, that all the movements of America 
are regarded there with a deep soUcitude, if no measures 
have been adopted with the view of influencing those move- 
ments, an exception which we are hardly at liberty to make 
since England, at least, has done much in the matter ; it 
would be a pohtical absurdity to think otherwise, when un- 
der the eyes of so watchful a government legions, brigades, 
and smaller corps have been levied, and have sailed for South 
America completely accoutred for the field ; when far the 
greater part of the arms, ammunition, and appointments of the 
patriot troops have been supplied from the English work 
shops ; and when millions upon millions have been borrowed 
from the capitalists by agents residing within a few squares 
of her ministers, while the stock thus created has been an 
object of speculation openly in her exchange. 

Is England a member of the Holy Alliance "? no man in Ame- 
rica can give a positive answer to this question. The famous 
declaration of her sovereign " shyed" it; and I must say that 
the impression that declaration made upon my mind at the 
instant I read it, an impression not impaired but rather 
augmented by every dictum of the ministry and by her whole 
course of conduct since that speech, was, and is, that Eng- 
land is actually a party to the alliance sub modo — with some 
qualifications or restrictions. Some of her most able and 
confidential diplomatists have certainly been present at every 
congress of the powers who are avowedly engaged in the 
alliance. It is true they might have been present in order to 
take care that the interests of their country did not suffer, 
and that immediate information might be obtained of all 
things that passed; but things did pass which were not in 
direct accordance with her interests ; the determination 
respecting the Spanish affairs, for example, when France 
was authorized by the congress of Verona to put down the 
disturbances between Ferdinand and the constitutionalists. 
The direct interest of England in this instance was that 
the contest should continue ; because she would have had 



28 

the supplying of both sides with ai-ms and clothing, accord- 
ing to her usiial practice — a practice so inveterate that her 
mechanics supplied clothing for the troops of Napoleon in 
his conflict with herself*. But, asks a partizan of England, 
is no confidence to be placed in her declarations, and her 
disposition to support the cause of limited monarchy and a 
participation of the body of the people in the government ■? 
■ — To this I answer decidedly, JYO — I place no faith in the 
verbiage of England on this subject. When has she sup- 
ported those principles in truth and in reality 9 She waged 
eternal war, it is true, against the Bourbons, but she made 
equal war against France as soon as the revolution was un- 
equivocally on foot, and in every stage of its subsequent 
progress ; she supported the princes of Orange in all their 
contests with the popular party in Holland, when the de- 
clared object of the Orange faction was to place and to keep 
their chief at the head of the Dutch government ; she made 
war in Spain, first to place on the throne a member of the 
most despotic family in Europe, and, an hundred years after- 
wards, to maintain there a prince who was repudiated by the 
estates of the kingdom ; in both instances exhibiting herself 
as the champion of legitimacy as inveterately as the Holy 
Alliance can be ; she was art and part with the allies in the 
cutting up of nations, when they were dismembered with- 
out the ceremony of asking their consent, at the close of 
the struggle with Napoleon, including the establishment 
of the house of Orange on a throne, after so many years 
aspiration at one ; she stood by a passive spectator of the 
first and the successive partitions of Poland, when a single 
cannon discharged by her would have prevented those viola- 
tions of public law : and, where the whole game was in 
her own hands, in the East Indias, she has instituted or per- 
petuated the most egregious despotism in the world, not ex- 
cepting that of Constantinople. No act in her history au- 
thorizes the expectation that she will ever be found arrayed 
on the side of civil freedom. She resembles the Spartans 
in this ; contented with enjoying the name, the shadow, of a 



Vide Segur's account of the conversations at St Helena. 



29 

Jiberal constitution herself, she not only sees with indifference 
the subjection of other nations, but she even reduces those 
who are in her power to a state of servitude. I therefore 
place no faith in any declarations of hers in favour of liberty 
among other nations ; why even at this hour, an explicit and 
positive declaration on her part would terminate the dis- 
tresses in Spain by inducing the grant of a liberal con- 
stitution, and she might in like manner end the war of 
extermination in Greece. Men are liable to draw errone- 
ous conclusions from known facts, but there is no reason 
perceptible to my conceptions for disbelieving that England 
is a party to the Holy Alliance, either on account of the 
avowed objects of that confederation, or on account of the 
views which are imputed to it by its enemies. This argu- 
gument on the probability of England's being a party, in 
some measure, to the Holy Alliance, may seem to be a wide 
digression ; its application will be seen presently. But I 
must add one word more. England has certainly to appre- 
hend from the Alliance something like the armed coalition, 
to interfere with her maritime pretensions, in case of future 
wars ; nevertheless, I see no reason, for this cause, to conclude 
she is not now one of the confederates ; she would even gain 
more by conciliating the other powers, and by presence in 
their councils, then by open and avowed opposition to them. 
I will not stop to discuss the question whether it is the 
true interest of Europe, and particularly of the Holy Alli- 
ance, to interpose in American affairs. Interest, well under- 
stood, would perhaps be the mother of every good action ; 
for nothing can be more to the real interest of nations or of 
an individual, than virtue, justice, and correct conduct. But 
whoever argues invariably upon the presumption created by 
the adage that all men are governed by their interests, will 
find himself wofully deceived ; he must presuppose that all 
men are equally and profoundly intelligent. The contrary is 
the fact, and the whole tenor of experience and history shews 
that prejudice, passion, caprice, momentary impulse, or ex- 
citement, govern men's actions much more than deep rea- 
sonmg upon causes and their consequent effects. Those 

E 



30 

who are at the head of affairs, after all, are but men, and 
are under the influence of the emotions which regulate the 
conduct of the rest of the species ; " homo sum et nil huma- 
num a me alienum puto," may be and ought to be the ground 
for judging, as well as the motto, of every statesman. In the 
bosom of a politician ambition for celebrity succeeds ambition 
for ofiice ; a desire of distinction, and, in consequence, an in- 
clination to seize upon and to identify himself with whatever 
leading or important events and contingencies agitate or at- 
tract the attention of the world, and to signalize himself by per- 
forming something that may be striking, without much regard 
to any consideration but that it is striking, and may hand his 
name down to posterity as well as claim the notice of the 
present generation; these motives produce the greater part 
of the actions of the rulers of the earth, whether they are 
clad in the imperial ermine, or more really sway the destinies 
of their countries from the less ostentatious recesses of the 
cabinet. I will therefore not argue now upon the interests of 
Europe in the participation she may attempt to take in 
American concerns. 

There is a consideration however which demands fuller 
examination, as it is more likely to induce an interposition 
of the Holy Alliance or of the sovereigns of Europe in their 
separate capacities. That coalition proves itself by its ac- 
tions and by its declarations to be under the influence of the 
ignis fatuus of the balance of power — a notion which has 
been the pretence or excuse for more bloodshed than any 
other topic which has agitated the world since the crusades 
— a novelty in history, which cannot be traced beyond the 
middle or the latter part of the reign of Louis XIV. when it 
originated in England as a catch word to serve as a rallying 
cry for party. It becomes every man to be diflident in 
assertions of this kind, but my feeble researches never met 
with the idea until that period; or if they did it has entirely 
escaped my notice ; and if I can be corrected I shall be the 
first to acknowledge my error. It certainly was unknown 
during the Carlovingian epoch, during the period of the 
Norman inroads, during the contests of the English kings 
for French territories or for the French crown, during the 



31 

almost universal empire of Charles V. ; or at least I cannot 
find it until the period above designated. 

This idea of preserving the balance of povt^er may lead 
the sovereigns of Europe (or their cabinets which is the 
same thing, and indeed the real thing as matters stand at 
present), to apprehend the consequences of the establish- 
ment of a number of rich, and several powerful, republics, 
connected by numerous ties of commercial and political 
sympathies, although separated from them by the surges of 
the vast ocean. Should such an apprehension possess the 
minds of European statesmen, there is no fixing bounds to 
the extent to which they may think, or pretend, themselves 
impelled to mingle in American affairs. It is possible — it 
is much more than possible, it is extremely probable, that 
such will be the result of the midnight meditations of the 
members of the Alliance, especially when they see that the 
southern republics, if not ourselves, are fully sensible of the 
urgent expediency of uniting their forces and of cementing 
their natural sympathies, in order not only to resist foreign 
aggression, but also to preserve that harmony among them- 
selves, without which they must inevitably be the victims to 
ceaseless and devastating commotions, and be the prey of 
any power which will take the trouble to seize the dominion 
of their beautiful and auriferous regions. It will be consid- 
ered that the prolific nature of the American population, 
the vast riches and resources of its territories, the maritime 
inclination of many of its sections, the inexhaustible and ex- 
cellent quality of its materials for ship building, the vigorous 
activity inspired by the fresh youthfulness of those nations, 
together with that derived from the nature of our liberal in- 
stitutions, will very shortly produce a consolidation of power 
whose capabilities and whose action can only be circum- 
scribed by the sense of justice, respect for the rights of 
others, and contentment with its own condition, which will 
result from the principles on which those institutions are 
based. If foreigners have not full confidence in such mo- 
tives and such principles, they will naturally regard with 
great alarm the incipieiicy of such a power, and will conse- 
quently do all that in them lies to prevent its formation. If 



32 

this should be the course adopted abroad, nothuig is more 
necessary than that the United States should throw their 
weight into the scale, in order, by manifesting their deter- 
mination or by adding their force to the power of America 
if necessary, to prevent the assailing of the new empires and 
the subversion of the principles which we maintain: if a 
contrary policy be pursued across the sea, and I devoutly 
hope for it, a greater confidence will be inspired by our tem- 
pering the southern vivacity with the phlegm of northern 
constitutions. 

The continental powers can hardly be possessed of the 
fancy that these nations could feel a desire to extend their 
dominions, when their actual territories are already so ex- 
tensive that it will require at least two centuries to give them 
even a moderate population, and when it is so evidently the 
interest of every man of property inhabiting them, to con- 
centrate the population, rather than to encourage its diffu- 
sion over countries added to those whose great extent and 
sparse population occasion many serious inconveniences. 
If the allies argue, however, from premises drawn from 
the thickly inhabited and closely bounded countries of Eu- 
rope, and if they shall be so misadvised as to inflict upon 
America the necessity of contending with them to avoid be- 
ing cursed with the notion of that political hallucination, 
the balance of power, then will they find the English fleet 
a most desirable auxiliary to their projects ; and then will the 
question, whether England be a party to the Holy Alliance, 
become one of the gravest import. They can cross the seas 
without that fleet; but if England should be inclined to op- 
pose them, it would be a very disagreeable obstacle to a 
transmarine expedition. 

There is a curious circumstance with respect to the marines 
of Europe : England is eternally counting her ships and pub- 
lishing their amazing numbers; every statistical or military 
account is swelled with details about them : on the other hand 
France, Spain, Portugal, the kingdom of the Netherlands, 
Sweden, Denmark, and Russia, say scarcely any thing offi- 
cial on the subject of theirs ; we find a continental man 
of war every now and then named in the list of arrivals by 



33 

foreign journals ; and when any of our travellers happen to go 
into the harbours of Antwerp, Brest, or Toulon, not to extend 
the list, they are surprised at seeing forests of masts; and 
this, after the annihilation of the continental navies accord- 
ing to the English accounts, which by the bye detailed the 
the capture of more vessels during a few years of the late 
war than France ever owned. What is the reason of this 
vaunting on one side and this taciturnity on the other *? Are 
there in very truth so many vessels of war in England as she 
pretends "? We know that the vessels of France, the king- 
dom of the Netherlands, Sweden, and Denmark, are very 
numerous, but we do not know their number. Are there 
more men of war built and building in those countries than 
we have imagined'? They are certainly so numerous that 
there is no cause for concealing the number; but it is con- 
cealed ; and therefore the reason for the secrecy must be 
searched for in some other cause. It will be remembered 
that the public have no means of knowing these details but 
from official documents published by the governments. If 
the like conduct were pursued by individuals, we should say 
that the one desired to intimidate by an ostentatious display 
of his strength and by overrating it, and that the others really 
possessed greater force than they thought fit to exhibit. A 
man who knows the world encounters a " fire eater" with an 
absolute conviction that he wants bottom. However, whether 
the number of the English men of war be exaggerated or 
not, we knoio enough of them to satisfy us that it is an ugly 
business for a fleet of transports to cross the Atlantic with 
a prospect of encountering them ; although I am persuaded 
that the marine of the continental powers united is more nu- 
merous than the British ; and they have been taught by severe 
experience the absurdity of allowing themselves to be beaten 
in detail, which has been the great secret of the English na- 
val warfare, whether considered upon the great scale of the 
plan of a war, or upon the smaller one of a single battle. 
The extent of the coasts of the maritime powers, and the dis- 
tance between their naval depots, which of course render the 
junction of their fleets more difficult, have contributed to 
enable England to beat them as they attempt to unite, be- 



34 

cause she has always kept the main body of her fleets con- 
centrated at two or three harbours not very far distant from 
one another. This ought to serve also as a lesson to our- 
selves: the advantage of obtaining provisions and naval 
stores cheaper by dispersing the ships or fleets in different 
ports is not suflSicient to counterbalance the hazard of their 
being cut off" when they attempt to rendezvous, nor is it equi- 
valent to the important object of having the whole power of 
a navy concentrated, so that its blows may be struck en 
masse. The true tactique of a nation which owns line of 
battle ships is, to concentrate them all at one naval station, 
upon the first appearance of a war, and not to run the risk 
of delaying their junction until hostilities have actually com- 
menced. If the French fleets had been concentrated either 
at Brest or at Toulon when the war with England broke out, 
European politics would probably wear at present a very 
diflferent aspect. 

Instructed by dearly bought experience, the continental 
powers will no doubt endeavour by all means to secure the 
co-operation of the English fleet, if they should meditate a 
forcible interference with the relations of the two Americas ; 
and this will very probably succeed, by holding out to her 
the triple advantage of profit to her commerce, by supply- 
ing the armaments, as well as by extending the consumption 
of her manufactures in the countries — of benefit to her ship- 
ping interest by the transportation of the troops, and by car- 
rying their supplies — and of permanent emolument by pro- 
posing to her the lion's share in the distribution of the spoils 
and conquests. 

But will England unite in projects for interference with 
American affairs 9 She will do any thing which tends to 
promote the sale of cutlery and calicoes. At least I think 
so, and I believe my opinion to be sanctioned by all her past 
conduct — by the whole tenor of her history. 

If any one should ask why I harp incessantly upon Eng- 
land, and why I still return to the same theme in every stage 
of my argument ; I reply that she is our great rival in every 
interest, commercial naval or political, and even in glory; 
that she is at once our most powerful, most enterprising, and 



35 

most dangerous competitor ; that she is most able to do us 
harm ; and that her system, as well as her interest, is most 
directly in opposition to our own. 

I will conclude the present consideration of the Holy Alli- 
ance, and of European relations, with saying that, although I 
place considerable confidence in their public and solemn de- 
clarations, and ardently hope that they will be restrained by 
a sense of justice and propriety, and by respect for the opinion 
of the world and for the judgment of posterity — of history 
— yet it is so probable the notion of the balance of power or 
a desire of individuals to signalize themselves will prompt a 
course of conduct contrary to our hopes, to our best desires, 
and to our interests, that all possible measures of precaution 
ought to be adopted to repress any such impulses, and to 
obviate their consequences, in case they determine to molest 
nations which regard them with the most friendly senti- 
ments, but which desire no political intimacy with countries 
separated from us by half the globe, and differing from us in 
habits, in prejudices, in system, and in feeling. If the United 
States take an open and decided part with the other nations 
of our continent, this weight added to the aggregate force 
will make it so powerful, that it will probably restrain foreign 
powers from the conception of interference ; and if inimical 
designs are formed, it will render their execution next to 
impossible: if nothing injurious to us be undertaken, such a 
proceeding upon our side will produce no inconvenience : but 
if the reverse should happen, then our interposition becomes 
a matter of absolute necessity. 

We have more or less intercourse with many nations whose 
opinions are certainly to be highly respected, but whose re- 
lations with us are not such as to bring them into the scope 
of these observations ; it is therefore not thought necessary 
to treat of them separately and specifically. 



36 



CHAPTER VII. 



-I- PROCEED to some general considerations respecting 
the South American states, and Mexico ; observing here that 
whenever South America is mentioned without remarking 
the discrimination, it is meant to include Mexico, although 
she is in fact in North America ; following in this the com- 
mon and loose mode of designating among us the Hispano- 
American states. 

The question of independence from Spain is settled ; there 
cannot be a doubt of this. The vast change in every rela- 
tion may still produce some commotions, whose immediate 
causes may be, either effervescences among the people un- 
accustomed to liberty, and as yet scarcely prepared for the 
exercise of the power of self government which the revolu- 
tion has conferred upon them; or, the disappointment and 
and discontent of some who are deprived of the authority or 
privileges they lately possessed, and who will run the risk of 
losing the fortunes left to them as well as the immunities they 
have in common with the whole body of the people, in hope 
of regaining by a new order of things a portion of what 
they have lost, and still regret; or, finally, the ambition 
or excited feelings of others who are not satisfied with a state 
of secure mediocrity, but desire to elevate themselves to rank, 
power, or fortune, by means of intestine disturbances. Some 
few may be tempted by Spanish gold and the prospect of 
European titles to make movements in favour of the old do- 
mination of the mother country. The good sense of the peo- 
ple, their exhaustion and desire for repose after their late 



37 

struggles, will be sufficient to repress disturbances arising 
from the first of these causes; and their antipathy to Spain, 
excited by their sufferings, and by the relentless severity with 
which the war was carried on, will be a safeguard against 
any dangerous effects from the latter cause ; besides, there 
are so many men of talents, education, and influence en- 
listed body and soul in the support of the existing order of 
affairs, that they will be able to overwhelm all opposition, 
and to support effectually the actual condition of their re- 
spective countries. Spain has really done so much, or to say 
the least the conduct of some of her officers, for which she is 
held responsible, has had the effect of alienating the feelings 
of her late colonies so thoroughly, that they v^^ill endure sub- 
jection to any other power in preference to hers ; they never 
can forgive her for what they have endured, and her na- 
tional character does not promise that much will be done on 
her part to conciliate them : it seems rather probable that 
the resentment will be reciprocal ; as she is not likely to get 
over the offence to her pride, and the injury to her interests, 
which have been inflicted by the emancipation of the colo- 
nies. The separation from the mother country is therefore 
irremediable and eternal, whatever may be the discontent or 
the effect of a few persons who cherish fond recollections 
of the past regime — of an era which has gone to join the 
shades of departed centuries in the vast bosom of eternity. 

The first settlers of North America came from a coun- 
try where the principles of civil liberty were well known 
and established in theory if not in practice. They brought 
with them their prejudices, their habits, and a fitness for 
the form of government which was afterwards happily or- 
ganized ; indeed they had every thing but the name of 
republics, except the presence of a few of the trappings of 
monarchy, before our revolution; and of course as soon as 
a republican form of government was proclaimed, they were 
prepared to enter upon its duties and for enjoyment of its 
privileges. Many of them had sought, in the wildernesses 
of the newly discovered world, a refuge from what they 
deemed civil or religious oppression in Great Britain ; many 
distinguished men fled before the gloomy persecution of the 
F 



pretended commonwealth, or from the usurpation by a 
Dutch king of his father in law's and uncle's crown ; and many 
others, liberally educated and of eminent families, concealed 
themselves in woods and obscurity, from the cruelties, or at 
best the watchful jealousy which followed two unsuccessful 
although courageous attempts to reinstate an illustrious but 
illy advised and unfortunate family in what they supposed just 
and lawful rights. Altogether a mass of education, intelli- 
gence, and capacity for free institutions was assembled in the 
Anglo-American colonies, which qualified them for the beau- 
tiful system under which we live, and rendered any other 
foreign to their dispositions and almost impossible to be 
established. Not so in the Spanish colonies. They were 
colonies of soldiery in the first instance, familiarized with 
the obligations of military obedience, made more imperative 
by constant danger amidst a large population of conquered 
nations; and in fact they have always worn very much the 
aspect of conquerors cantoned in subdued countries. Their 
settlements in America were based upon forcible conquests 
of numerous partially civilized nations: ours were different; 
they were locations of civilians in regions almost deserts, and 
feebly contended for by scattered and small tribes of unim- 
proved savages, to oppose whom few troops were necessary, 
so few that the civil authority would have been irresistibly 
paramount, even if the hereditary prejudices of the popula- 
tion, and of the military drawn from its bosom, or from 
amongst the people from whom both took their origin, had 
not assigned that preeminence to the magistracy. 

That the Spanish colonists did not possess strong features 
of character and education, with bravery, and talents, would 
be an assertion contradicted by every page of their annals. 
They certainly were endowed with all these qualities in an 
eminent degree ; else they never would have been able to 
effect and to retain the conquests they made. But the very 
nature and necessity of their establishments were decidedly 
military, and as an inevitable consequence savoured of despo- 
tism. The wonderful smallness of the numbers of the forces 
by which the conquests were made, tended to increase the ha- 
bits of military obedience, and of course to foster the despotic 



39 

principle (of which prolific germs were brought with them 
from their native country) because of the necessity of main- 
taining their discipline, at least so far as was required for the 
perfect organization of their troops, their aptitude for instant 
concentration, and for immediately taking the field ; a neces- 
sity imposed upon them by the dangerous position they long 
occupied, surrounded and mingled as they were with a mul- 
titudinous and scarcely subjugated population. This state of 
things continued so long as to become habitual, to have 
infused deeply into the breasts of the conquistadores the 
military or despotic principle, and to have disseminated it 
universally among those who followed them as mere settlers 
or civilians, all of whom brought from home, as we have 
just said, strong dispositions for it and confirmed habits. 

The strong monarchies of Europe arose from exactly similar 
circumstances. The original inhabitants were very liberal, 
almost democratic, in their institutions; influenced it is true by 
superstitious reverence for their religious orders, and headed 
by a military chief, who exercised but little of sovereign au- 
thority except on the field of battle, was elected by the body 
of the people, all themselves soldiers or by officers who were 
so elected. In the dark ages and shortly after them, these 
aborigines were invaded and conquered by Romans, Franks, 
Goths, Vandals, Moors, &c. who found themselves obliged 
to preserve their military array in the midst of vanquished 
nations more numerous than they were; thus they became 
the privileged class, tyrannizing over their serfs and vassals, 
a distinct caste in each state, subsequently modified into the 
nobility of each : They long preserved considerable freedom 
or license among themselves, but never losing their military 
cohesion, nor the aspect of armies quartered upon their con- 
quests, which were necessary to enable them to maintain 
those conquests ; a state of affairs, which continued down to 
the French revolution, and which still partially remains in 
some countries. Familiarized with tyranny by their own 
authority over their vassals, and by the military spirit of 
their institutions, they were not unapt to endure the monar- 
chical yoke, already respectable to them in the persons of 
their commanders in chief, when the dissensions among 



40 

themselves required a modification of their forms of govern- 
ment, and when bold, talented, and ambitious chiefs of the 
state knew how to extend an hitherto limited command in 
chief for war, and little more than presidency over civil 
affairs, and to convert their restricted authority into absolute 
government, by alternate artifice, corruption, and force. 

As the foundations of the Hispano-American colonies 
were laid upon bases so widely different from those whereon 
the settlements in the English colonies were established, it 
is not surprising that the descendants of the first settlers 
should be found much less prepared than we were for re- 
publican institutions. But they have adopted liberal ideas, 
and these never retrograde ; there is not an example of it in 
history. Rome gives none ; she was always a monarchy or 
an oligarchy ; Greece the same ; and all other nations which 
were free owed the loss of their freedom to conquest*. The 
South Americans will therefore always preserve liberal in- 
stitutions, whatever shades of difference or mere names of 
offices may distinguish theirs from ours — saving always the 
possibility of new conquests, which hardly can enter into 
the calculation of remote contingencies. The old leaven 
may however produce some disturbances before the mass of 
the people become familiarized with their new situation and 
their new rights, although every day renders them more and 
more adapted to their condition, and diffuses the ideas and 
principles upon which they are hereafter to act ; they are, 
as it vvere, educated or instructed by the passing events of 
every day in the science of self government; and it appears 
that nearly all their reading, influential, educated, and ta- 
lented men are enlisted in this righteous cause. I infer, 
that although the inexperience of the people in the science 
of self government may be the cause of some slight efferves- 
cences of an anarchical tendency, or the misguided ambition 
of a few leaders may impel them to attempts of an opposite 
direction, nevertheless the question of liberal ideas and in- 
stitutions is finally decided in Hispano- America. 

Insurrections or internal dissensions, however slight, are 



Both Rome and the Grecian states were originally conquered countries. 



41 

always deplorable events ; and nothing will tend to interdict 
them, and even to prevent the formation of an idea of them, 
so effectually as the grand system upon which we shall 
presently treat. 

Am I asked to be more explicit, and to say what I intend 
by liberal institutions; if I mean forms of government exactly 
similar to our own ? — Why the fact is, the topic of this pam- 
phlet, however illy it may be here discussed, is too grave for 
an essay to acquire popularity or to flatter prejudices or to 
pamper an appetite for subserviency, even if such were the 
character of the writer, which certainly is not. The whole 
fenor of this argument, which is all that an anonymous writer 
need appeal to, proves that its great object is to contribute 
the feeble effort of one of her humblest votaries, to rivet the 
glorious standard of liberty upon the loftiest rock of the vast 
Andes, as well as to perpetuate its display upon the Alleghe- 
nies — where its splendid blazonry, surrounded by the mete- 
oric blaze of the middle heavens, and guarded by volcanic 
fires, may endure forever a dazzling beacon and a rallying sig-| 
nal for all the friends of civil and religious freedom. These 
pages also shew a sympathy with those who are born in the 
same continent and an attachment to my fellow citizens which 
enable me to speak the truth without fear of consequences, if 
I could fear them ; the South Americans cannot doubt my 
sincere friendship, nor my own countrymen my allegiance. I 
therefore answer directly to the point. I do not mean, when 
I say Ifberal institutions, that they will be exactly like ours. 
I do not see how it is possible for the inhabitants of Hispano- 
America to reconcile themselves or their habits to so serious 
and unadorned a form of government as that of these United 
States, until at least two generations have elapsed, and I 
doubt whether their taste will not always require much more 
decoration than we do; nor do I perceive how they can se- 
cure to themselves the great objects of civilized, and indeed 
of every stage of society, security of person and of property, 
without a much stronger government than we have. But I 
am convinced that despotism in any shape is now impossible 
in those countries, and that they are more liable to tend 
towards an opposite extreme for some time to come ; which 



42 

liability will require that their governments be endued with 
considerable strength and energy : I believe also that op- 
pression on the part of an aristocracy or of the government 
will not be endured by the people. I do not think that they 
are arrived at the condition when an unarmed individual, as 
is the case among us, shews a paper to an offender and de- 
sires him to follow, with a certainty of being obeyed, and 
when the person thus cited does follow such an officer, 
without resistance, before the proper tribunal ; but I believe 
that public opinion and the laws will not permit informal or 
groundless arrests there, and much less personal restraint or 
loss of property without fair trial and conviction by due legal 
formalities and adjudication by the competent authorities, 
according to law. These are liberal institutions ; and from 
them will gradually, but certainly, ensue an illumination of 
the public mind, which will, I hope, prepare them for, and 
secure to them, as near an approach to our forms as is re- 
concilable to their climate and to the excitability of their 
temperament, so much more ardent than ours. With these 
principles and institutions the name which they may bestow 
upon their chief magistrate, or the greater or less duration 
of his office, will not be a matter of so much consequence 
as it would be in Europe ; except as adding to, or diminish- 
ing, the security for his not exceeding the restrictions im- 
posed upon him, in which lies the real difference between 
republicanism and monarchy. Once again I repeat that the 
system I advocate will have a tendency to increase the spirit 
of republicanism in America and to diminish any hidden 
inclination to monarchy — as I believe. However, be my 
faith what it may in the dispositions of Hispano-America, 
what I have just said will afford sufficient reason for enter- 
taining some apprehensions in case the Holy Alliance, or 
one or more of the greater powers, shall think fit, and be 
permitted, to interfere with their concerns ; there is no know- 
ing what may be effected by European intrigue, influence, 
and, above all, money, operating upon the vestiges of ancient 
prejudices and habits, in favour of forms of government 
which may be supposed naturally more agreeable to them, 
and in behalf of popular leaders endeared to their fellow 



43 

citizens by services or by merit. If our conduct towards the 
new states should alienate their affections and prevent a 
close and familiar intercourse between us, thus precluding 
them from witnessing the effects of our institutions, and de- 
priving our example of influence ; if, instead of drawing close 
the bonds of affinity, we induce them, by our indifference or 
our coldness, to throw themselves into the arms of the allies, 
then indeed I will not pretend to assert that their new born 
liberty and liberal ideas may not be so much distorted as to 
lose all manner of resemblance to the original model. I 
see no particular reason why animosity towards them should 
be excited even if the new states were to become monarchies, 
but certainly such a fate would be a source of infinite regret 
to us, after our having flattered ourselves with contemplation 
of the beautiful vision of a republican continent ; and the 
disappointment would give us the more pain, as we should 
have the consciousness of self reproach, as well as the 
censure of the expecting world, for not having done what 
was in our power to influence a different result for the vast 
expense of blood, treasure, and human happiness which their 
independence has cost. It would be said that we made a 
great uproar about the French revolution, and that many of 
us talked of going to war on that account, vi^hen we could 
have been of no kind of use to France, or to the grand cause 
of civil freedom ; but that now when the nations colimitary 
with us require our assistance or our influence in favour of 
the same principles, and when we could be of effectual service 
in the cause, while we gained their gratitude, we stand aloof; 
and that it proves us to be a nation of more words than deeds 
— an imputation to which, as one of the nation, I would be 
very loth to submit, and which I hope we do not and will not 
deserve. Permanent foreign dominion I consider now im- 
possible over any of those states, whatever may be the par- 
tial effect of temporary incursions ; but foreign influence is 
a very probable circumstance, in case an American system 
be not adopted ; and it remains for us to conjecture what 
would be the deleterious effect of such an influence upon 
our own concerns — nay, it can hardly be termed conjectural, 
it is as plain as the light of the noon day sun ; and if there 



44 

shall be a universal confederation of the American states 
from which we are excluded or from which we exclude our- 
selves, there are no bounds to the injury we shall sustain. 
We cannot prevent such a confederation, although we may 
refuse to join it ; and it is manifestly a thing decided upon j 
nor can we prevent the European powers, or at any rate some 
of them, particularly England, from acquiring an influence 
which we reject, and from exerting it to our disparagement ; 
we shall, by neglecting them and the conjuncture, alienate 
their present friendly feelings, give umbrage, and create 
sensations of suspicion or jealousy ; the consequence will be 
a disinclination for political and commercial relations with 
us, of which England and the rest of Europe will instantly 
take advantage ; and probably these sentiments will be fol- 
lowed by a coolness towards the forms of government of which 
we have given the example. 

It is directly the interest of the new nations to form a grand 
confederation in order to keep the peace between themselves 
and to enable them to defend themselves against foreign 
attacks. They have the first principle, the germ, of confede- 
ration in their being all of one family : Brazil to be sure is 
only a kind of cousin to the rest : identity of language and 
of religion strengthen the fraternity. There is therefore 
every reason to be certain that they will confederate, and the 
reasons are quite as cogent as those which induced these 
United States to do so, but their vast extent will necessarily 
prevent their confederation from being so intimate as ours : 
it will be more like a fascia of nations than one nation. They 
have abundance of intelligence and of perception of their 
true interest to convince them of the expediency of the 
measure, and the example of the Holy Alliance proves 
that a grand confederation of nations is a possibility and is 
in conformance with the illumination of the age. There 
would be little doubt therefore of their confederating, even 
if Bolivar had not proposed it now. If the system is formed 
without us, in the very probable case of any contest arising 
between them and us, we shall have to oppose the force not 
of one member of the confederation, which we should do 
with success, but of the whole united strength of the allied 



45 

powers, and the conflict would be most perilous. I have 
sufficient confidence in the resources, the vis of my country 
to believe that it can not be subdued, but a contest with the 
power of all the rest of the continent would be excessively 
prejudicial to us. France, with her immense strength and 
wealth, has given an example of what a nation has to expect 
when a continent is arrayed against it; we can not ration- 
ally calculate upon being more successful than she was, 
especially when we recollect what innumerable armies she 
possessed, their admirable discipline, their familiarity with 
war, the strength of her government, and above all that she 
was headed and her armies led by the first captain of the 
world. 

I have no doubt the rest of the continent will confederate, 
with us or without us, and it appears to me that it would 
savour of the most unpardonable imprudence and rashness, 
that it would be tempting and defying destiny, to hesitate in 
uniting in a system which promises us safety from every peril, 
which will secure to us every advantage that politics can 
afford, and which does not threaten us with a single incon- 
venience, unless peace and safety, commerce and wealth, are 
inconveniences. If we choose to preserve the right of mak- 
ing war when we please, we may do so; but then we must 
abide the lot of war against fearful odds in America, and of 
foreign war without assistance, or even with a risk of having 
our limitrophes marshalled against us. 

A proof of what has been said above, about the influence 
of ancient habits and prejudices, is found in the actual state 
of the Brazils. It does not seem that the imperial government 
will possess much influence or ascendancy over the other 
states, nor that it will change its form in its own territory j 
the prejudices of the people, and the power of the aristo- 
cracy, are too great to anticipate a change, and the latter 
have too much to lose to part with their present prerogatives 
without a severe struggle, which the great majority of the 
inhabitants does not appear inclined to make against insti- 
tutions familiarized by the recollections of infancy, and ren- 
dered attractive by the pomp, ceremony, and captivation of 
regal splendour. 
G 



46 



CHAPTER VIII. 



Ml 



-EXICO will probably continue pretty much as she is. 
She had a rich, brave, and powerful nobility ; such of the no- 
blesse as have not fallen in the revolutionary contest, or have 
not emigrated, have consented, whether voluntarily or on 
compulsion makes no difference, to the abrogation of their 
privileges, and are prudently enlisted in the interests of the 
republic — prudently on both sides, since the mass of the peo- 
ple have thus secured to themselves the education, talents, and 
hereditary courage of the cidevant nobility, and these have 
avoided the dangers and misfortunes of a contest, which might 
otherwise have overwhelmed the whole country. Besides, 
Mexico is so proximate, has had openly or secretly so much 
intercourse with us, that she could not fail to have imbibed 
a portion of our democratic spirit, much larger than the other 
states had an opportunity of acquiring. Hence has ensued 
their adoption of our singular form of confederation, which 
differs in so many points from the Germanic, Helvetic, Bata- 
vian, and Rhenish confederations, and from several former go- 
vernments in Europe, and which nevertheless agrees with 
them in many of their prominent features. The differences 
between those and the Mexican confederations are so conside- 
rable that it is almost certain ours was the prototype for the 
present Mexican government. The establishment of this pe- 
culiarity was unexpected to the world. It possesses a com- 
pactness, a principle of adhesion, beyond ours, because all 
that is now comprehended in the Mexican confederation 
formerly composed one viceroyalty, and, although divided 



47 

into presidencias, audiencias, and capitancias generales, was 
still subjected to the central authority of the kingly represen- 
tative at Mexico, formed part of a great kingdom, and was 
united by the community of feeling or interest which charac- 
terize a nation, and radiated, together with the settlements, 
from one common focus. This entirety has been recently, 
not broken, but only politically divided by ideal lines, for 
sake of more convenient government; the sympathies and 
interests, laws, customs, and habits of life, as well as of ideas, 
remain as heretofore the same in their leading principles. 
The North American states on the other hand, were origi- 
nally settled by emigrants for different causes, at different 
times, of different castes, with different sentiments, different 
interests, and under different leaders ; nothing, for instance, 
could be more dissimilar than the puritanical settlers of 
New England, and the royalist cavaliers of Maryland and 
Virginia, the quakers of Pennsylvania, and the catholics of 
Maryland. They formed separate communities and govern- 
ments with no bond of union between them and in no wise 
connected, except by their common responsibility and alle- 
giance to the sovereign of the mother country : of course, 
when they threw off this allegiance they were each as sove- 
reign and independent of each other as countries could be 5 
they broke no ties between themselves, because there were 
none to break ; they had no tie to break but that by which they 
were bound to the English crown; and their future connec- 
tion was an alliance between sovereign independent nations 5 
the confederation was a compact, and a relinquishment of 
the capital or general government with many points of par- 
ticular government, to a central delegated sovereignty — it 
was the melting down of many nations, and recasting them 
into one colossal image of strength and power, of which 
they composed the mighty limbs — an operation, an event, as 
indispensable to our welfare, and happiness, to our domestic 
tranquillity, and to our external security, as the breath to the 
nostrils of our life. But the fable teaches us that the mem- 
bers once repined at their dependence upon the common 
source of their strength ; and it is sometimes necessary to 
remind the states of our confederacy of this wise apothegm^ 



48 

The circumstance of all Mexico having so recently composed 
one body corporate, gives us abundant reason to hope that 
a long time will elapse before the motion of the great wheel 
of government will create a sufficient centrifugal power to 
inspire the least tendency in any of its members to fly off 
from their mutual cohesion. 

Whether it has been perfectly prudent or not in Mexico 
to have adopted this system, remains to be proved. All the 
great nations known to history have, at one time or other of 
their existence, been little else than confederacies; and all 
have, in the lapse of years, in the process of illumination, or 
of ambition, been agglomerated into homogeneous masses. 
The examples I will name are, the English heptarchy, not 
to penetrate the darkness of Pictish tradition; I think the 
same may be said of her condition under the Norman aris- 
tocracy, a mere confederation of nobility, down to the dynasty 
of the Tudors ; the union of the English and Welsh crowns 
from Edward down to a comparatively modern date and 
perhaps even from an anterior date ; the feodal relation of 
those countries; the scarcely more than suzerain submission 
of the Scottish clans, with the kingdoms of Man, and of the 
Isles, to the crown of Scotland ; the union of the Scottish, 
English, and Irish crowns, when the brows of the descen- 
dants of Fergus the first were bound with the triple diadem; 
the Irish sovereignty conquered by the English kings : France 
under the Merovignian, Carlovingian, and Capetian kings 
down to Louis the eleventh : the accumulation of crowns 
on the heads of the house of Este or Austria descended 
to the branch of Lorain : and Spain until Charles the fifth. 
All these and many others have exhibited exemplars of con- 
federations, and all have been merged in united and uniform 
monarchies, except the German empire, which still shews an 
appearance of separate governments, as far as this idea is 
reconcilable with the empire of a single head, and a central 
cabinet at Vienna. Our confederation began upon different 
principles, with a greater exemption from foreign violence 
than any of those quoted, and promises, from the cool reflect- 
ing temper of our people, to remain much longer than any 
of them in its present situation, et fac Deus omnipotens per- 



49 

petuam rempublicam. We were separate sovereignties, and 
practically and deliberately united ourselves into one grand 
republic. Mexico was one undivided nation, and has peace- 
ably and deliberately subdivided herself into separate al- 
though confederated republics. 

Thus both have originated in principles and rudiments 
very different from those to which the present state of Eu- 
rope owes its commencement. We might perhaps improve 
our condition by the introduction of a greater degree of uni- 
formity in our laws, and constitutions -, but the fundamental 
principles and the general system are the same in every state 
of the union, and the machinery of our government is so ge- 
nerally harmonious and so good, that it is better for us to rest 
contented with some slight inconveniences, rather than in an 
attempt to " make well better" incur the risk of damaging 
parts which can not be ameliorated. Mexico, having adopted 
our plan, will probably be of the same opinion, and we have 
therefore every reason to expect that her system will endure 
for a long period. 

She is less liable to be affected by foreign influence or 
force than any part of South America, because she is so 
much stronger. She is even as strong at least as ourselves, 
for Humboldt in his last publication of statistical works* 
whose accuracy, talent, labour, and research, are beyond 
praise, estimates the population of Mexico in her average 
most settled parts, comprehending an extent of 600 con- 
tinuous square marine leagues, at 1300 inhabitants to the 
square league ; while the most populous region in the United 
States covering only 522 leagues has not more than 900 inha- 
bitants to the leaguef : again the whole territory of the United 
States contains an average of 58 souls to the square league, 
while Mexico averages 90 souls to the same superficies. He 
states the population of Mexico at seven millions at the date 
of his estimates, and that of the United States at 10,220,000 : 
the superficial extent of the territory of the United States he 
calls 2,086,800 square miles, or 174,306 square marine leagues, 



* Vol. VI. Part I. pp. 185, 196 : English edition, 1826. 
t By the census of 1820. Ibid. 



50 

and of Mexico 75,830 square leagues*. Hence there is a 
much greater relative population in Mexico, than we pos- 
sess, upon a similar territory. She has the advantage of a 
capability of producing every thing our country affords, and 
many other richer staples ; we have to counterbalance these 
advantages the characteristic perhaps of greater energy of 
character, or at least of somewhat greater industry. If 
therefore it is morally and practically impossible to over- 
power the United States by a foreign force as I confidently 
and devoutly believe, it is also impossible to overcome 
Mexico, and neither the one nor the other have any thing to 
apprehend for their institutions except from themselves, ex- 
cept from the operation of domestic causes. " Liberty may 
expire in anarchy or by the transitory usurpation of a daring 
chief; but the true elements of monarchy are nowhere found 
in modern colonies." I agree with this sentiment, generally: 
it will be seen by the argument used some pages back, that 
my opinion is that all the European monarchies are founded 
upon conquest, by which the race of the conquerors acquired 
the distinction of caste; the word is technical, there is none 
other to substitute for it; party, order, faction, will not do; 
noblesse not more, for they have frequently bought into it; 
gentilhommerie will not, for it means now " a certain set,^^ in 
which Brummel was, and the Murrays, Northumberlands, and 
Butes, the Montmorencies and the Montgomeries, were not. 
The armies or hordes which conquered, were either chiefs 
otherwise called officers, or soldiers : the former became 
nobles of various grades according to their ranks; what we 
should call lieutenants general became dukes, fursts, and so 
forth, according to the different languages, and the other 
officers were entitled according to their ranks down to sim- 
ple knights, ritters, &c. the soldiery were the gentry or the 
yeomanry of the conquered countries ; some of the abori- 
gines who united with the conquerors were gratified with 
titles. The mass of the conquered nations were vassals, 
serfs, or tenantry. The commanders in chief became konig, 
kings, and imperators. This was the primeval origin of the 



* Humboldt, Vol. VI. Part I. p. 127. 



51 

dynasties and aristocracies of Europe — as I think, without 
pretending to censure those whose opinions differ from mine. 

But the South American and Mexican settlements were not 
conducted altogether according to the European model. Im- 
mediately after the conquests, torrents of civilians, ecclesias- 
tical, commercial, agricultural, and mechanical, poured into 
those golden regions, in numbers far exceeding the totality of 
the victors of any one of the territories which now constitute 
primary monarchies in Europe. William the conqueror (coti- 
queror translated " acquirer" by Blackstone, drolly enough) is 
said to have conquered or acquired England with no more than 
60,000 men. The descendants of the conquerors of France 
were computed at the breaking out of the revolution at one 
million of souls out of twenty-five millions. In Mexico alone 
Humboldt calculated that in 1810, about three centuries 
after the conquest, there were of the pure white race (with- 
out discriminating how many ecclesiastics were coloured*) 
1,107,567, out of a total population 6,122,354. This datum 
by itself suffices to shew that the conservation of an aristo- 
cracy of the conquerors is impossible ; it would be so nume- 
rous as to be a democracy of aristoi : and in consequence we 
find that the titled nobility there was very inconsiderable 
compared with that of Europe. It therefore is very evident 
that the elements of monarchy are wanting in Mexico, and 
whatever individual element there was, is now destroyed by 
the destitution, with their free consent or by the force of po- 
pular sentiment, of the nobility created by the Spanish crown. 
I emphasize created, because the European saying, which is 
arrogant enough, that "the king can make a nobleman, but 
cannot make a gentleman," has more political truth in it than 
would appear at the first glance, in as much as it indicates 
the truth of the position that the origin of nobility and of 
monarchy is to be traced to the first conquests of the nations 
where it exists. These observations apply to the rest of the 
Hispano- American states. 

The time appears to have gone by when it was possible to 
subjugate such countries as Mexico ; the lights of the age 



There were very few, and they were of the Indian race. 



52 

are two widely diffused, the population too numerous; and 
any power which might acquire an ascendancy, would have 
to adopt the forms of government, as well as the habits of 
thinking and of acting, which prevail in the country : indeed 
a pretty decided proof of this has been given in the fruitless 
attempt of Iturbide, (who was certainly a distinguished, a 
gallant, and a brave man) and in his unfortunate endeavour 
to imitate Napoleon's return from Elba, although it rather 
resembled the affair of the courageous but rash Murat ; he 
lost his life in a way and from causes not well understood in 
this country, and his fate will be a warning to others for a 
long time. Still I am far from being Utopian or enthusiastic 
enough to say that the official organs or the details of 
government cannot be changed by powerful invasion, as- 
sisted by a faction in the country, rendering the army or 
the magistracy too strong to be reconcilable with our ideas 
of republican government, and too formidable to the neigh- 
bouring nations. It is to guard against the possibility that my 
arguments run. I think nevertheless that any such conque- 
rors, if they may be so called, will be obliged to conform to 
the popular sentiment — a sentiment which will be inflected 
however much as possible, in all the great leading maxims 
of government ; and nothing like absolute power can exist; 
it could not exist without a calm and deliberate legislative 
and popular surrender of the popular rights, such as took 
place in Denmark in the last century, a thing utterly impro- 
bable, after all that has passed. An objection may be made 
that the mass of the people is very uneducated, has in fact 
not been the decided and active agent in the revolution, 
except a portion of it followed some leaders to the field 
from mere personal attachment or induced by prospect of 
gain, and that these are proved by the shouts it has bestowed 
almost equally upon royalists or patriots as either was trium- 
phant, which shews that it has not yet a decided public sen- 
timent. But public sentiment is in all countries the opinions 
and the impulse given by the aristocracy, if I may be allow- 
ed the expression, of activity, talent, education, and influence. 
In Mexico, to their glory be it spoken, this aristocracy, and 
that which is composed of wealth and rank in society, as 
well as the magistracy and military, have generally taken up 



53 

and propagated liberal ideas ; they have espoused the peo- 
ple's cause, and have set to work in earnest to qualify the 
mass by education and instruction to understand, appreciate, 
enjoy, and perpetuate the principles of freedom. 

But let us suppose for a moment that a popular and pow- 
erful brave man of talents were to arise there, who had the 
ambition to set himself at the head of the government, recast 
in the strongest shape which the prejudices of the people 
would admit, with a title for the chief magistracy new or of 
undefined import to the ears of the descendants of the Euro- 
pean race, such as cacique, inca, principal, or any other — for 
as I have before said, it is not the name but the spirit of the 
magistracy which makes a difference in the form of govern- 
ment, and Cromwell was as despotic with his title of protec- 
tor as he would have been with that of emperor — suppose his 
project be to perpetuate his dynasty by means of elections 
by a conservative senate, the members of which are appoint- 
ed by himself and his successors, or who are susceptible of 
appointments to offices at his gift or are under his influence 
by any of the thousand modes which ambition would devise; 
suppose he commences by the stale trick, older than the age 
of Pericles, of exciting discontent and feeble attacks upon the 
person of the executive, and demands, what could scarcely 
be refused under such circumstances, a faithful and well paid 
guard to defend his person and to carry into effect the ordi- 
nances of the legislature ; suppose that he enter into com- 
munication with some European power which would be 
disposed to assist in raising up a monarchical form of go- 
vernment in this hemisphere and which would furnish him 
with supplies of treasure. What then would be the effec- 
tual defence of republican institutions in that country; and, 
if they should be subverted, what would be our condition 
in relation to a strong, armed, and ambitious government, 
upon our borders, with an army demanding occupation and 
employment? We should have to fight, and we are able to 
do so, is the immediate answer of a young man. Agreed ; 
he has good health, a good horse, a sword, and a cloak, can 
raise a legion, and would be one of the combatants; but 
he will grow old ; and then *? Why the fact is that this 
H 



54 

business of fighting is a bad affair at best. Besides, we all 
profess to be attached to republican government; and yet a 
large army, which we must have to make war upon a neigh- 
bouring nation, is the most dangerous enemy to republics; 
large armies have always been the destruction of republics : 
they would cease fighting at some time or other; and how 
are they to be disbanded "? If they are strong and led by a 
man of talents — none other would be competent to encoun- 
ter our enemies — they would not permit themselves to be 
disbanded : " find me the men and I will find money to pay 
them," is said to have been the answer of a distinguished 
ofl[icer to a similar question. What becomes of our repub- 
lican government, what of our institutions, in that case 1 
Fighting is the ultima ratio; and it ought to be the very last: 
it is an argument which exhausts, and so produces a tempo- 
rary cessation of the dispute ; but it never convinces, and it 
leaves behind the germs of future discussions of the same 
kind ; or at least it excites antipathies, resentments, rivalship, 
and a thousand rancorous sentiments which break out in 
new aggressions and fresh hostilities, as soon as either na- 
tion which has been engaged thinks itself strong enough to 
recommence a war. Therefore it is infinitely better to pre- 
vent the origination, the birth, of such feelings, to anticipate 
by a prudent and harmonious policy, the possibility of inimi- 
cal proceedings; instead of relying upon the old method of 
burning towns, and of putting to death some thousands of 
our species, in order to persuade the survivors into measures 
that we wish. 

At no period of history down to the present time has there 
been a perfectly clear opportunity of carrying into effect the 
pious and truly political principle of peace ; because never 
before has there been an instance of a whole continent inha- 
bited by nations without previous prejudices against one ano- 
ther, without rivalship, and without causes of mutual offence. 
The spectacle of an entire quarter of the globe in absolute 
harmony has never before been exhibited; and if this beau- 
tiful picture could be perpetuated, human virtue would have 
gained over human passions a victory, whose reward would 
be the eternal applause of all the good and great. 



55 

Mexico is the most important nation to us in projecting 
such a system; because, being our next neighbour, there is 
the most probability of our coming into collision with her ; 
and with her is dissension most to be deprecated. It is with 
nations as with individuals ; if they stand upon punctilio, if 
they are watchful for any unintentional want of etiquette, 
they will have abundant causes of discord ; but if they are 
bound together by ties of interest and of close friendship, 
mutually respecting one another, and mutually attached by 
sympathy and feeling, neither expecting slights, and neither 
wishing to elevate its own reputation at the expense of the 
other, they would not be apt to quarrel ; this is the expe- 
rience of the world, which is and will be pretty much the 
same at every epoch. That frank and generous intercourse 
which arises out of respect for our companions and con- 
sciousness of meriting theirs, from a consciousness of cou- 
rage and of strength without a vain glorious desire of exhi- 
biting them (often occasioned by a little internal voice which 
whispers that they are not so great as they are proclaimed), 
and the intercourse of a liberal and manly disposition with 
those whose pretensions to the same characteristics are not 
disputed, very seldom are broken by the contests which oc- 
cur between persons of different qualities : when such mas- 
culine characters do quarrel, it is generally about some 
irreconcilable interests, and they are infinitely the most 
dangerous enemies, as they are the most valuable friends. 
Nations being only societies of individuals, national charac- 
teristics are those of the majority of the most influential of 
the individuals who compose the society ; and therefore almost 
all arguments which apply to individuals or to individual 
conduct, are equally applicable, but on a grander scale, to 
nations at large. 

The government of Mexico seems to be now quite as much 
consolidated as ours was at the same or even a greater dis- 
tance of time from our declaration of independence : it ex- 
hibits all the indications of solidity, and its machinery appears 
to work with the regularity of a settled establishment. In 
so new and so extensive a nation, some tumults or some local 
opposition to the laws are to be expected; but they will 



56 

probably be no more than temporary effervescences, to be 
repressed without much difficulty by the ordinary powers of 
the police, or at worst by the intervention of a small armed 
force; they will resemble the circles formed by some falling 
body upon the surface of a tranquil lake, which subside with- 
out disturbing the deep repose of the waters, and we have 
hardly to fear that tempestuous waves will again be thrown 
up by passionate hurricanes to threaten the safety of the 
barque of state. The people are fatigued and exhausted by 
the long sufferings of the revolutionary contest ; the fortunes 
of their great men are diminished ; the number of their lea- 
ders is decreased ; every thing demands repose ; and before 
the body politic has recovered from the effects of what has 
passed, and before it has so far forgotten the calamities of 
civil discord, as to render it liable to fresh excitement, a 
generation will have elapsed, the measures now adopted for 
popular instruction will have operated, and the principles of 
civil liberty will have been deeply enracinated, will have 
obtained a maturity which will enable them to defy most of 
the storms that can assail them. Nor is this calculating too 
largely upon the intelligence of the Mexican nation ; the 
nation which was susceptible of the school of mines, which 
has furnished the world with the greater part of its circulat- 
ing specie, where the desague Hucbuctoca was excavated, 
where the immense labours near Acapulco were executed, 
where a republic has arisen upon the debris and ashes of a 
despotic colonial servitude, where the prejudices and antipa- 
thies, sedulously cultivated for ages, against the oppressed 
aborigines have been surmounted, where that too long de- 
graded race has been magnanimously elevated from its pros- 
tration, restored to its due consideration among mankind, 
and raised to the level of a constituent portion of the com- 
monwealth — such a nation, so gallant in war, so generous in 
peace, calls forth the highest expectations of its destinies, the 
largest calculations upon its talents and its intelligence. 

It is sufficiently evident that until education (in which 
term are included not merely reading and writing but also 
information upon the arts of civilization) is more generally 
extended in Mexico, the higher classes of society, which are 



57 

educated or instructed, will be elevated to a distance more 
removed from the mass of the population than is compatible 
with the principles of genuine republicanism; for in my 
opinion the essence of those principles is the elevation of 
the mass of the people to a level with the rich by diffusing 
among them equal lights, thus enabling and teaching them 
to take advantage of the resources of the country; when 
this diffusion becomes universal in a nation the people will 
be all nearly as equal as the infirmity of our nature permits; 
no disparity will then exist, except that which Heaven cre- 
ates in forming some men without talents enough to profit 
of instruction or with too much indolence to do so, or finally 
that which arises from the vicious disposition of bad men. 
Until instruction becomes general in Mexico the educated 
men there will have great advantages over those who are 
destitute of education, and fortune is the apanage of instruc- 
tion and talent. Those who are rich, and those who belong 
to rich or to educated families, will naturally desire to in- 
crease their fortunes. Without this instinctive desire for 
acquisition and preservation of property, wisely implanted 
in our breasts by divine providence, mankind would be little 
better than the brute creation, indifferent about tomorrow 
and generally without an impulse for distinction or for im- 
provement of their condition. But this very desire of the 
rich to retain or to improve their property, and of the in- 
structed to acquire, is an additional guaranty to the stability 
of the government; they must know from the slightest reflec- 
tion that their interest imperiously demands public tranquil- 
lity for some years, and will of course exert themselves, now 
that the first tempest of passion is passed, to preserve tran- 
quillity : individual ambition is the only emotion which can at 
present interfere with the domestic peace ; and if there be 
the amount of intelligence in the nation which I attribute to 
it, the influential members of the community will interpose 
to repress it. 

Among the incidents which accumulate the guaranties of 
the stability of the government, the national debt must not 
be forgotten. The exact amount of it is not accurately 
known to me, as I hesitate to adopt any data of whose 



58 

general correctness I am not satisfied ; in forming that idea 
I may be mistaken, but I have taken the greatest pains to 
avoid error. I have no estimates of the present state of the 
Mexican finances upon which I entirely depend ; the debt 
however is large*. The security to the government afforded 
by the debt is a blessing which arises out of an inconve- 
nience. If all the debt were due to the inhabitants, the in- 
ternal tranquillity would be additionally increased; but on 
the other hand that part of it which is owing to foreigners is 
in fact so much money appropriated to purchasing the in- 
terest of their sovereigns in the durability of the Mexican 
government. If a person has an insurance upon a life, we 
may be very sure that he will not attempt its destruction, and 
that he will defend it from the attacks of others. Nor is this 
position at variance with what has been before advanced, that 
interest does not alone and exclusively govern the human 
race. I believe that men are more governed by tempo- 
rary impulses or passion, than by mere interest; nevertheless 
when an interest is plain, not contradicted or diverted by an 
opposite interest, it certainly tends greatly to restrain the 
impulse of the moment, and to moderate passion. The fears 
of the creditors of a nation for the safety of their debts is one 
of the strongest bulwarks of its government ; they will recol- 
lect that Frederic the great sequestered the Prussian debt 
to English merchants in order to retaliate upon England 
some aggressions upon his commerce, and they will recall to 
mind several other instances of the sort upon record ; they 
will fear that if a government be entirely swept away, the 
power which succeeds it, in order to disentangle itself from a 
heavy incumbrance, in order to have large funds at its dispo- 
sal, and in order to acquire that short lived popularity which 
is created by a pretended economy, will be disposed to ques- 
tion the policy and the validity of the contracts entered into 
by its predecessors ; they will apprehend the efficacy of the 



* Mr Poinsett estimated it in 1822 at sixty-one millions; but large additions to 
it have been since made, without considering, as we might fairly, the sums in- 
vested in the mining establishments by foreign capitalists. See Notes on Mex- 
ico, p. 106. 



69 

principle that national engagements made by a sovereign de 
facto are obligatory on the nation under any form of govern- 
ment and under any actual sovereigns. The proof of this is 
found in the market prices of government stocks, which fluc- 
tuate according to every rumour of domestic agitation or of 
disturbance in foreign relations. Hence the debts of the 
Mexican government due to its citizens will induce them to 
oppose any thing which tends to a radical change of system, 
and what is due to foreigners will secure all their influence 
over their own rulers to countenance the actual state of 
things; an influence whose extent will be bounded only by 
the proportion between the weight of those foreign creditors 
in their own country, and whatsoever force other persons 
may have who are interested in an opposite line of conduct. 
Every additional sum of debt gains an additional adherent 
to the government. I must not be understood however here 
to recommend the policy of overwhelming a nation with debt ; 
such an interpretation would be equal to supposing a quart of 
laudanum is meant when ten drops are prescribed; this is a 
medicine designed only for cases when the human body is 
diseased, and debt is an application proper for a nation only 
when the body politic is in a state requiring extraordinary 
remedies ; neither the one expedient nor the other is to be 
tampered with, and either is to be avoided, except in extreme 
cases J but it is the same with respect to debt as medicine, 
poisons in themselves, a judicious use of them in necessary 
cases may produce good effects. 

So that, upon the whole, I see no reason to anticipate 
fresh convulsions in Mexico for a considerable time, or at 
least I do not anticipate any of a very formidable nature ; 
and I consider the government as permanently established 
as any other of its cast, always excepting the problematical 
interposition to which I have previously alluded. 

Mexico must always possess a great predominance over 
the Hispano- American states; she was the colony which 
attracted the greatest attention of the mother country; her 
viceroyalty was more splendid than the others, was a more 
striking personification of the metropolitan sovereign; she 



60 

added the name of a kingdom to the long roll of the titles 
of the Spanish monarch ; part of the revenue she afforded, 
went directly to the support of some others of the American 
possessions of Spain : these things must have an effect upon 
ancient prejudices; and at present her greatly superior popu- 
lation, revenue, wealth, resources, and strength, must give 
her a decided ascendancy; so that, if her government be 
administered with only ordinary prudence, policy, and mo- 
deration, her influence over the other cidevant colonies must 
infallibly be very great. Her example is therefore of vast 
importance : if she adopts a monarchical form of government, 
a precedent will be given which will be much respected, and 
which can scarcely fail to find imitators ; if, on the contrary, 
she adheres to a republican form, it will afford a cogent argu- 
ment for the liberal in the other Hispano- American countries. 
A question of serious consequence to us is, whether Mexico 
will ever become a great shipping power. That she will be a 
commercial power of the first order is unquestionable ; the soil 
which produces cocoa, coffee, vanilla, cochineal, dye and fur- 
niture woods, sugar, grapes, cerealea, cotton, and vast amounts 
of the precious metals, which supplies, or is capable of sup- 
plying the staples of the tropical regions, as well as those of 
the most favoured among the temperate climates, can not fail 
to attract the merchants and the merchandize of the whole 
world ; her silver has constituted by far the largest part of 
the plate and specie of Europe, and a great deal of that of 
Asia, since the first discovery of the southern continent, and 
this article alone would be sufficient to make her the ren- 
dezvous of commerce. But will she possess a large amount 
of commercial shipping, and will she carry for herself? The 
question can not easily be answered as yet; nor until the 
radical and wonderful change in her political situation, do- 
mestic and external, shall have wrought its inevitable conse- 
quences upon the character of her population, and until the 
effects of so many and of such vast causes be thoroughly 
developed. During her colonial subjection maritime enter- 
prises were forbidden to her by every restriction which the 
most watchful jealousy could devise ; since the revolution, 



61 

she has been constantly occupied in contending for her 
emancipation, or in arranging her internal affairs; nor has 
there been time for her previous habits to be altered. Whe- 
ther her inhabitants ever will have a taste for navigation is 
doubtful; because the great majority of them reside upon 
the elevated land, which is remote from the Atlantic. The 
region which skirts the gulf of Mexico has the reputa- 
tion of being very sickly, and this reputation appears to 
be too well founded. It is almost impossible that large 
towns can exist in a malignant climate, and large towns 
accessible from the sea. are invariably either the causes or 
the consequences of a great amount of shipping. Besides, 
it is not easy to conceive how a large number of vessels 
can be built in sickly regions, because their mere con- 
struction necessarily concentrates numerous workmen, and 
their families. We can not estimate the effects which may 
be produced by future improvement of the country, cut- 
ting down the forests, and agriculture; but these, if they 
ever take place on the coast, must be the work of ages, for 
the work cannot be commenced on the sea side ; that is the 
focus of the bad air; it will have to be a gradual progress by 
working downwards from the inland heights tov\fards the 
sea; yet every step made from the heights brings the la- 
bourer into the infectious district, with the disadvantage 
that the volume of bad air lies concentrated in, and spreads 
from, the flat lands and the forests between him and the sea, 
while he cannot attack the evil in its source without a cer- 
tainty of loss of health, nor can he attack the outskirts of it 
without approaching, with some risk, that mass of vapour 
and of miasmata, whose cause is, to use the expression, inac- 
cessible to him. It might be different if the rivers which 
make into the gulf were adapted to navigation; but their 
estuaries, or all that part of them which could otherwise be 
navigated, lie within the insalubrious district; when they pe- 
netrate deeper into the country their beds partake of the 
elevation which so remarkably distinguishes the interior 
from the sea bord. If it were not for the climate, Vera Cruz 
now containing only 6000 or 7000 inhabitants, would be one 
of the largest cities known ; and yet the universal movement 
I 



62 

from Tampico to Vera Cruz, after the castle was taken, proves 
the latter to be the best port on the coast. 

It may be said that the produce of the soil and of the mines 
will enable the Mexicans to buy ships, if there be a difficulty 
in building them. On the other hand if the ships are owned 
there they must often lie in port for considerable time, while 
their crews are liable to all the atmospheric influence, with 
that danger enhanced by their constitutions having been 
divorced from their native climate by voyages to northern 
latitudes, wherein far the greater portion of their commerce 
is demanded. In short, unless the information we have about 
the climate be most egregiously incorrect, or unless changes 
are eifected which seem to be forbidden by nature, I do not 
see how Mexico can be a large ship owner on her Atlantic 
coast. We are told that the shores on the Pacific bord are 
more healthy; and from the configuration of the territory a 
considerable coasting trade must be carried on there, espe- 
cially after California becomes well settled. The coasting 
trade is the nurse of maritime enterprise ; and the demand 
for silver in eastern Asia, as well as for several of her staples 
in the archipelagos of islands near the Asiatic coast, will be 
a strong inducement for great navigation there; indeed it 
seems highly probable that Mexico will be able to trade 
from her western coasts to China, Hindostan, and the islands, 
with so many advantages, such as cheapness of silver, low 
price of provisions for crews, saving of distance and time, 
as well as avoiding the risk of doubling cape Horn or the 
cape of Good Hope, that she will supplant the European 
and North American commerce with those countries, becom- 
ing herself the great India trader and the entrepot of that 
trade which will be transported across from the Pacific to 
the gulf coast, while the rest of the world will go to her to 
receive teas, silks, and fine muslins. If her inhabitants 
take an inclination for navigation this will probably be the 
consequence. The opinion is justifiable that Mexico will be 
a maritime power on the Pacific, but that her trade with 
Europe, North America, and all the Atlantic ports, will be 
carried in the vessels of other nations. 

What other nations'? What nation will be her chief car- 



63 

rier* "? This is the all important point. Each nation will 
participate in the trade ; but England has the greatest num- 
ber of ships, can navigate at least freight, and will strain 
every sinew to engross it. One of the greatest objects I have 
in view when advocating the American system, is to ena- 
ble us to compete with England on this point, and to secure 
to ourselves a large portion of what promises to be the most 
lucrative commerce ever known, by conciliating the affec- 
tion of the people to whom we are connected by a thousand 
ties of major interest. 

After discussing the question whether Mexico will have a 
large commercial marine, the next desideratum is to ascer- 
tain whether she will possess a powerful military marine. 
If the position be correct that ship yards for merchant ves- 
sels can not safely be established on the gulf coast, it follows 
with double certainty that naval depots, or places of construc- 
tion, can not be located in this quarter for men of war; be- 
cause they require much larger congregations of workmen; if 
the inference be right that the Pacific coast will be the site of 
her mercantile building yards, it follows that her fleets will 
be constructed there. But it is not enough that her build- 
ing position be ascertained; in order to bear upon her rela- 
tions with the nations which border the Atlantic, she must 
have some port on this ocean for refuge, for refreshment, and 
for repair: otherwise, however powerful she may be in the 
western seas, she will be a zero in the great scale of Euro- 
pean and North American maritime polities, as far as force 
is concerned. Where will that port be"? Her relations with 
Columbia will perhaps afford her such a harbour. If Cuba 
should cease to belong to an European power a naval sta- 
tion on that island would be much more convenient. The 
other islands are too small to sustain a population sufficient 
for defending a post of such importance. Besides a fleet at 
Cuba would occupy a position analogous to a tete de pont 



* See Niles' Register, 7th of April 1827, where the whole number of foreign 
vessels entering her ports is called 641, of which those of the United States are 
said to be 399. 



64 

in army tactics, it would defend a vanguard post, and seal 
the entrance to the gulf. If a port should be found in our 
territory of Florida capable of receiving fleets of line of battle 
ships, that, or the mouth of the Mississippi, would be the next 
best; and these could not be used by Mexico in time of war, 
without compromising our neutrality. Her fleets would not 
only protect herself, but in case of necessity, would be im- 
portant to the security of our gulf frontier. Therefore inti- 
mate relations with her which would authorize our permitting 
her the use of our harbours would not be advantageous to 
her alone; we should ourselves derive great advantages from 
them. 

It will be impossible for Mexico to be a great naval power 
unless she builds her own ships; she may form a nucleus 
for her future fleets by purchasing vessels abroad at first; 
but all history shews us that no nation has been formidable 
at sea, which depended exclusively upon foreigners to sup- 
ply her with ships. If therefore my data are correct, Mex- 
ico cannot be a strong maritime power unless she builds 
upon the Pacific, and possesses a safe harbour upon the At- 
lantic; which harbour she must acquire either by intimate 
connection with another nation, or by conquest. The for- 
mer is the better alternative, and my hope is that we shall 
afford it to her, for our own sake, as well as for hers. There 
are few things more desirable for us than that Mexico 
should have a stlrong navy; united to our own, a power 
would be presented to foreign nations, which they would 
hesitate to outrage ; whereas a long period will elapse be- 
fore our navy will be numerous enough to cope with that of 
the great maritime powers of Europe, without alliances 
with other nations, and conjunction of theirs with our fleet. 
Mexico will not be a dangerous competitor for us, because 
of the disadvantage (if what has been said be true) of her 
centre of maritime strength being on the western ocean; and 
it will be very long before her navy rivals even the present 
number of ours. 

The next point of view in which Mexico is to be consi- 
dered, is in respect to manufactures. She is already a great 
manufacturer : we justly consider our iron works as a most 



65 

important branch of our manufacturing interests; but she is 
a metal manufacturer to a much larger amount ; as is evident 
from her coinage aK>ne, which was in 1809 |'26,172,982 at 
the mint in the city of Mexico and |; 1,500,000 at other 
mints'^ ; it is better proved by the amount produced from 
the years 1492 to 1803, which was $2,028,000,000 ; of which 
from 1600 to 1800 $l,353,452,020f. Can a country, that 
has worked up such a value in a single article, be supposed 
an insignificant manufacturer'? Again, the value of manu- 
factured tobacco was in 1802 $'7,686,834: the total value of 
manufactures in the same year is given by the author I quote, 
who generally appears to have taken the data from baron 
Humboldt, at eight millions of dollars ; although I do not 
clearly understand how this amount is to be reconciled with 
the statements of the amounts manufactured in several pro- 
vinces, nor with the details of wine and brandies of difterent 
kinds, nor with the table of exports he gives a few pages 
previously, most of which necessarily undergo some degree 
of manufacturing, as even the agricultural producej, could 
not be exported without it; still less do I coincide with him 
— although I feel it to be a prima facie evidence of error to 
differ from that accomplished gentleman — when he computes 
the manufactures to have diminished one half in consequence 
of the war; there can be little doubt of the diminution of the 
metallic production, but of the others I hesitate. It is much 
to be regretted that we have not official statements of the 
actual condition of affairs. The immediate clothing, and 
other articles of household consumption, for the use of the 
body of the people in every nation must always be the pro- 
duction of household or village industry ; since no nation upon 
earth could purchase them from abroad, they must be made 
upon the spot. For example, we imported during the year 
1825 |'11,392,264§ worth of woollen cloth, when we had at 
least eleven millions of inhabitants ; now the consumption of 



* Notes on Mexico in the Autumn of 1822, pp. 104, 105, by Mr Poinsett. 

t Ibid. p. 174 From Humboldt, I believe. 

t Ibid. pp. 96. 98. 100. 102. § Vide Treasury Report. 



66 



woollens averages for man, woman, and child, at least five 
dollars per annum, which will make fifty-five millions value of 
cloth of one kind or other made of wool : the same reasoning 
applies to every country and every article, and shews that uni- 
versally manufactures must exist sufficient for the ordinary 
wants of the mass of the people, however moderate those 
wants may be, in consequence of the state of civilization, of 
their customs, or of the climate. But in every country fashion 
or caprice will occasion, among the rich and luxurious, some 
demand for fine articles and foreign productions ; and the 
only way in which we may feel the eflfect of manufacturing 
industry in Mexico, is by her making up things which inter- 
fere with the sale of those that we prepare for exportation, 
or which can be sold here at a price less than what we can 
make them at for our own consumption. I do not see any 
cause to apprehend either of these contingencies for a long 
time in any of the manufactures yet established among us : 
on the contrary, it is so evident as not to require demonstra- 
tion that Mexico will afford a market for many of the articles 
we now manufacture : whether we or England are to supply 
her is a different question, the decision of which I think will 
depend in great measure upon the course adopted with re- 
spect to the grand object towards which the arguments in 
these pages are directed. The distance that the manufac- 
tured articles will have to be carried by land to the sea bord 
will always operate to prevent a rivalship with us, if Mexico 
shall hereafter be able to manufacture much cotton, wool, or 
leather, the only items I observe in Mr Poinsett's notes which 
are likely to be extensively worked upon in both countries. 
If the accounts we have of the scarcity of fuel in many parts 
be correct, there will be a difficulty in the establishment of 
steam works, and it is also said that there are not many scites 
for water works : if these accounts be true, we can not be 
competed with in manufacturing, at least for export. But 
there are so many articles in either country which cannot be 
procured without great expense in the other, that it is for their 
mutual interest that both should prosper in those which are 
appropriate to them, since they would then be better able to 
procure what they want, by purchase or exchange, and what 



G7 

can be supplied from the work shops of that one of them 
which is best able to answer the demand. It is not the 
actual existence of dead or torpid resources, even of silver, 
which constitutes the real wealth of a country ; it is the active 
passing of those resources from hand to hand : it would avail 
little to a nation that the people should eat offof silver, if they 
wanted clothing, nor would lots of cloth be of great profit, 
if they wanted bread ; it is the facility of exchanging the one 
for the other, the ready sale, and steady demand, which 
" make a wilderness to blossom like the rose." The United 
States and Mexico should therefore from interest, as well as 
from a better feeling, desire the prosperity of one another. 
I do not, in fine, expect competition between us and Mexico 
in manufactures, but I anticipate that the increase of the 
means of either will give an ability to exchange its produc- 
tions advantageously with the other. 

Agriculture occupies the major part of the inhabitants of 
all America. Will the Mexican agriculture interfere with 
ours '^ We will include the productions of the forest in this, 
to avoid making another head, for it is quite as germaine as 
stock agriculture to simple cultivation. The productions 
of the Mexican soil are generally so different from those of 
our own, that I do not see in them any prospect of rivalship. 
I believe that she has live oak, and she has mahogany ; these 
and perhaps some other woods may come into market with 
our ship timber; but they will have to be procured within the 
region of maladies; and the present price of such timber is so 
large that our shipping interest at least will not be the worse 
for an additional supply which will lessen the value of 
the article ; the quantity of these woods is so limited, they 
are so difficult of access and of working, that we need not 
dread too great an influx of them into the market, to injure 
those who own forests in which they grow. Her other 
woods are only exported for dyes or furniture ; we do not 
possess them, except some sarsaparilla, of which we do not 
supply much. Her vanilla and cochineal are not yet intro- 
duced here. She will no doubt be able to grow coffee and 
sugar for exportation ; the land we have adapted to their cul- 
ture is circumscribed within narrow bounds. Provisions and 



68 

flour will be consumed by her increasing population in a 
larger ratio than by ours, because she already has more in- 
habitants to the square league than ourselves, as was shewn 
above ; if she exports them to Europe, we are nearer to that 
market by a thousand miles and have more vessels to trans- 
port them. She only exported in 1802 .f 300,000* ; of flour 
and of provisions ,^100,000. She can never injure our grain 
market, baron Humboldt to the contrary notwithstanding, 
although I dilFer from any remark of his also, however ca&ual, 
with great reluctance But it is manifest from what is just 
said, that she cannot send grain to Europe as cheaply as we 
do. As to the West Indian islands, how can she compete 
with us there in these staples *? what can they give her in 
return 9 Not sugar or tropical productions ; she will raise 
them in such quantity herself that they will be drugs if she 
brings them home, and, when all the sugar countries come into 
cultivation, it will not be the policy of her merchants to add 
to the stock abroad by taking cargoes from the islands to glut 
the market, when she has so much of her own to sell; not 
specie, for she is herself the mother of silver (if I may trans- 
late a Spanish term) and the price of the precious metals 
must be such in her territories that importation of it will be 
a losing concern. The staples of our country then, will not 
be interfered with by her in the islands ; she has so many 
richer productions that she can well dispense with the expor- 
tation of grain and provisions, unless to some of the South 
American states on the Pacific ; the profit awaiting her more 
important productions will be so much larger that her chief 
attention will be devoted to them, and they are so different 
from the articles we raise, that they can create no uneasi- 
ness to us. To sum up, the produce of her soil instead of 
being an impediment to the vent of what is afforded by ours, 
will rather be a prolific source of commercial prosperity to 
both, by force of the trade and exchanges it will enable the 
countries mutually to drive. In peace neither can injure the 
interests of the other, and the commercial relations must be 



Notes on Mexico, Chap. IX. 



69 

fountains of prosperity to both. Her trade with the new 
southern states will no doubt be considerable, but it is not 
likely to diminish in a formidable degree their demand for 
those things with which we are able to supply them, not even 
for our lumber, grain, or provisions, except on the Pacific 
coast ; and it is very certain that, if those countries are well 
governed, they will very soon be able to suffice to their own 
wants in these articles ; timber to be sure is not wanting on 
the Pacific bord, but in Buenos Ayres they will hardly be able 
to make it grow on the vast plains near the city, and there will 
of course always be a demand for it in that market ; our sup- 
plying that demand will depend upon our being able to fur- 
nish the article cheaper than it can be brought down the 
river ; but Mexico will find it difficult to compete with us. 



CHAPTER IX. 



T 



HE gulf of Mexico, that " close sea," and the Caribbean 
sea, demand particular attention from us and from all Ame- 
rica. An immense commerce is destined to traverse their bo- 
soms, where a very great and rich navigation now exists. The 
trade of Mexico, of Guatimala, that is of the whole isthmus 
of Colombia as far as Punta Galera, the extreme point of the 
island of Trinidad, our own of the Floridan coast of the 
Mississippi, coasting or foreign, must exist, waver, or cease 
as those Western Mediterraneans are secure or dangerous. 
An enemy's fleet in that sea would be ruin to the commerce 
of all those vast regions. It is true that the inconvenience 
will be partially, and not more than partially, alleviated, 
when our wise and splendid projects for uniting the waters 
of the Mississippi, by means of canals, with those which flow 
into the Atlantic, are accomplished (if they ever are accom- 
K 



70 

plished), and that a palliative for impediments to the trade of 
Colombia will be found in the egress of part of it through the 
Rio Orinoco ; but these will be poor compensations for the 
loss of the natural channel for the commerce of such immense 
regions as circumscribe the gulf and the Caribbean sea. 

In order to insure the possession of these seas by the Ame- 
rican nations, the constant presence of a strong fleet is in- 
dispensably necessary. It is no argument to say that hitherto, 
since the independence of South America, the danger of 
foreign force there has not been felt; the political attention 
of Europe is only just now attracted to the southern part 
of our continent; the curious, ill judged, expedition of Eng- 
land to the mouth of the Mississippi at the close of the late 
war is warning enough for ours and the succeeding genera- 
tions ; and the pirates who infested the islands have demon- 
strated what mischief may be done even by small and desul- 
tory forces in that quarter. 

The gulf and the Caribbean sea may be well defended 
by a strong squadron within them, or at one of the islands 
which compose their Atlantic outline. The passages or 
entrances between the islands are scarcely any of them 
entirely free from hazard, and are all of them hazardous 
for the ingress of a fleet ; that entrance which can be made 
by floating in on the current which enters this immense ba- 
sin, is the one which demands the most apprehension: but 
the same current of water or of wind which brings in an ini- 
mical fleet, will carry the one stationed to oppose it, beyond 
reach, if not strong enough to fight in the gorge. When the 
enemy is in the basin the protecting fleet may either fight, or 
maneuvre from the eastward so as to impel its antagonist 
upon the coast of the continent, guarded in some places by 
rocks and shoals, and in others by the inexpiable climate; 
or, being acclimated, it may keep the continental side of 
the basin and drive the enemy towards the islands, where 
the hazard of action is unreasonable, because in case of dis- 
aster it would be hardly possible for any ship, which might 
be disabled or driven before a superior force, to avoid being 
carried by the variable winds and currents upon some of the 
innumerable reefs, shoals, and dangers which encompass the 



71 

islands; nor could the sound ships escape without incurring 
the same risks, as well as others which make the navigation 
among the complicated passages between the islands objects 
of anxiety even to single merchantmen, and much more for- 
midable to vessels of great draught, pursued by an enemy. 

But these dangers are reciprocal : if the protecting squa- 
drons be defei^ted, they are exposed to what the assailants 
would have to encounter. They must fight for it then. The 
hazard to the defenders would not be so great, however, be- 
cause they would have the long circle of friendly coast for 
refuge, and their danger in case of defeat would not be great 
unless they injudiciously fought to windward and beyond the 
middle of the gulf or of the Caribbean sea. They should 
never fight, even with the view of driving the enemy upon 
the continental shores, unless they were nearer to the conti- 
nent than to the islands. These must be our grand tactics 
if we are ever called upon to contend for the mastery of that 
vast naumachia, in spite of the gallant maxim of our sea- 
men, TO FIGHT WHERE THEV SF.E THE FOE. Thc particular 

tactique, the details, will one day probably exhibit the most 
beautiful scene of naval operations, the finest specimens of 
marine skill and science; in which every talent for maneuv- 
ring, and all the daring of courage, will be nerved to the high- 
est exertion. Dangerous passages of entrance to contend for, 
a fine smooth water within for action, with the site fenced in 
by shoals and rocks, leaving room enough for the grand evo- 
lutions of two large fleets, affording a certainty to the fleet 
which may conquer of a complete and efficacious victory ; 
these circumstances combined will render a contest for pos- 
session of the gulf and the sea one of the most interesting 
studies that can engage the eye or the nieditation of a mili- 
tary man. 

If an enemy should obtain possession of the gulf or the 
sea, his means of annoyance would be unlimited, every port 
would be ipso facto blockaded, and he might devastate the 
whole coast ; but, if he were beaten, his whole fleet would 
probably be lost. 

I dwell upon this subject in order to communicate my deep 
impression of its importance, and to shew the necessity of 



72 

the presence there of a fleet much larger than we are ourselves 
as yet 'Av to spare from the force it is indispensable for us 
to maintain upon our Atlantic coasts, and which I see no 
means of providing, except by an intimate connection with 
the other nations of the continent : it is as much for our 
interest as for theirs, and it is essential to the interests of all, 
that such a fleet should exist in the gulf of Mexico, and in 
the Caribbean sea. It will not do to wait for the breaking 
out of a war and then attempt to get possession ; the odds 
are so largely against a fleet endeavouring to enter in face 
of an enemy, that the power which is first in possession will 
probably keep it : therefore the American powers must in 
common prudence be always in actual and strong possession. 
The island of Trinidad will be a most important station in 
such a contest, and should be acquired by the American na- 
tions, strongly fortified and occupied, standing as it does at 
the extreme point of the continent, and covering the gulf of 
Paria, which should be made the southern rendezvous of the 
protecting fleet, provided the Dragon's mouth, the channel 
between Cape Paria and that island, is or can be made pas- 
sable for men of war*, and provided it be healthy, which is 
doubted ; since it will not escape observation that the game 
of the protecting fleet is to be harboured in such way as to 
maneuvre inside, and a little in the van, of the entering force, 
which is far preferable to the pis aller named above of pres- 
sing the latter towards the coast of the continent; the 
currents and the island reefs will be more serviceable auxili- 
aries when the assailants are pressed outwards; vse victis 
would be more than a mere proverb to them in that case ; 
the chief object should be, keeping as much as possible in 
in the middle of the sea or gulf to force all their fleet into the 
variable currents, where they must drift at a rapid rate, and 
to close upon them and fight only when they are off" some of 
the reefs ; if they are able to get into the middle of either, 
we have nothing left but to make for the bottom of the gulf 
or of the sea, or if there be any equality of force to have a 



It is passable no doubt. 



73 

fair battle for it, ship to ship, and gun for gun. The gulf of 
Maracai bo should probably be the middle rendezvous, and a 
port in our territory the most northern, if Cuba continue in 
her present political situation. We may talk of peace and 
safety, but our southern frontier, and whatever is covered 
by it, as well as the whole basin of the Mississippi, can nei- 
ther have peace nor safety if an enemy to this country rides at 
large in the seas bounded by the islands: there is a proximity 
of combustible materials in that quarter which are too full of 
hazard for us to permit our coast to be approached by a 
foe. This is a delicate point I know, but the whole of my 
theme is of the deepest import to the United States, however 
illy it may be here discussed ; and the truth had better be 
whispered now, at the moment when a safeguard against 
evils is proposed, than thundered forth in an hour of peril 
when precautions are to be synchronitic with the approach 
of their exciting causes. I do not however apprehend any 
thing like permanent conquest, by an enemy in conse- 
quence of an excitement of the kind to which I allude, I 
place too much confidence in the stalwart bravery and 
the vigour of our citizens to fear conquest, or permanent 
possession of territory, or lasting change from those causes 
in the condition of those citizens who inhabit the part of the 
country spoken of. But great disasters and individual dis- 
tress may arise from thence ; and to prevent these I would 
"hang out the banners on the outward wall"; I would have 
the access to our coast on the gulf forbidden to an enemy. 
In order to maintain possession of the gulf and the Caribbean 
seas, their circumference must, in my opinion, be possessed 
by nations in close amity with one another; and the basin of 
the gulf itself must be occupied by a fleet strong enough to 
drive out whatever power may attempt to enter it. That 
fleet can at present be furnished only by a union of the 
squadrons of the nations whose dominions form the coasts. 
The enemy I apprehend will not be American; the power of 
the nations of this continent will shortly be too equally ba- 
lanced for any of them to be able to domineer in the gulf; and 
their means of retaliation are too great to allow any one to 
meditate annoyance lO the others in so delicate a point. 



74 



CHAPTER X. 



N considering the importance of the gulf of Mexico, and 
of the Caribbean sea, and the mode of defending them, our 
attention is naturally directed towards the islands, and espe- 
cially to Cuba. 

Human vision is not strong enough to penetrate the ob- 
scurity of the future destiny of the West Indies. If the 
islands were large enough to support a large population, or 
if there were unity, or even sympathy of sentiment, language, 
or principle, among their inhabitants, sufficient to induce 
them to coalesce, they might at some distant day become in- 
dependent, and compose a powerful state of the second order; 
maintaining and protecting their existence as a people by 
means of a large navy, for which the richness of their pro- 
ductions, the extensive commerce they might possess, and 
the number of the population they might contain, would 
afford ample resources : there are many circumstances which 
would tend to qualify them for such a system, if the charac- 
ter of their inhabitants were different from what it actually 
is. But it is in vain to speculate upon what might be the 
result of circumstances which do not exist. The islands are 
inhabited by proprietors who have emigrated (or are descend- 
ants of emigrants) from countries as different from each other 
in dispositions, inclinations, and character, as they are dis- 
tant in position on the globe; and however these dissimila- 
rities may have been lessened, or even run into a common 
type of general uniformity, by the influence of a common 
climate, by the identity of their occupations, pursuits, or 



75 

habits, and by the changes of sovereigns, which most of them 
have undergone, there still remains the fundamental princi- 
ple of different origins, and especially the aversion, or, to 
express it more moderately, the disconnection of feeling, 
which constitutes the individuality of nations, and which 
has never in history been subverted, except by conquest, or 
by the application of power equivalent to conquest — even 
then it has endured for ages in spite of amalgamation by 
community of government and of general interests. 

These proprietors form but a small minority of the popu- 
lation of the islands* : the great bulk of the inhabitants are of 
the servile class, of a different race of the human family, kept 
in subjection by the presence and exercise of an armed force. 
The pride, the interest, and the prejudices of the one class, 
with the desire of equality and the characteristics of the 
other, render any idea of a fraternal concord, sufficient to 
constitute a nation, almost an absurdity. The masters cannot 
even occupy the position of that soldiery which originally 
acquired the dominion in Europe, which has been discussed 
at some length heretofore ; there was not the same dissimila- 
rity, not the constitutional antipathy, between the blue eyed 
Gauls and the dark haired Franks, nor between the Nor- 
man and Saxon, as between the white man and the negro : 
the subjugated countries were possessed by men of the same 
denomination as the subdued in the roll of mankind ; there 
were therefore no insurmountable obstacles to their incor- 
poration into the same social compact. It is vain to con- 
tend with the prejudices of the world, however benevolent 
or Utopian may be the ideas of some abstract reasoners ; but 
the white and the black races can never be amalgamated, 
the prejudices are too deeply rooted, and seem to be im- 
planted in our very natures ; nor do I know that it would be 
better for either race to eradicate those prejudices. Huma^ 
oity dictates that the disparity should be rendered as little 
offensive as possible, and that the superiority of the com- 
plexion which has the ascendancy should not be exercised 
in acts of oppression, still less of cruelty ; but the difference 



As one to five .—Humboldt, Vol. VI. Part II. p. 833. 



?6 

does actually exist in the nature of things, and it will exist, 
in spite of cant, or of argument, which is much more effec- 
tual. If it were not for the total distinction of the two races, 
the violent opposition of the two colours, which interpose a 
barrier (whose subversion certainly would cause a blush in 
the great majority of the white race) to the commingling of 
the bloods, there would not be so wide a difference between 
the state of civil society in the islands and that which subsis- 
ted in Europe in the periods immediately following the con- 
quests of the several countries of that continent; there is not 
very great difference between the actual condition of the 
negro slave and the pristine state of the serfs, villains, and 
franklins of Europe, although some, or at least one, of the 
countries where the bulk of the population was composed of 
these classes, do make such a clamour about the modern imi- 
tations of their ancient customs. The same antipathy, or 
proud superiority, which was entertained by the Franks to- 
wards the Gauls, by the Normans towards the Saxons, the 
Moors towards the Spaniards, and by these last towards 
the Moors, when they recovered the dominion of their 
natal soil, the same sentiments, natural o the conquerors to- 
wards their captives, were entertained, now are felt by the 
white masters towards their negro slaves. But as there 
did not exist such strongly delineated traces of demarka- 
tion between the conquerors and the subdued in Europe, as 
between the white man and the black, the prejudices were 
not so inexpiable, the repugnances were not so violent, nor 
was the inequality so irreparable. In this case, until the 
sentiments and prejudice of the world shall undergo an en- 
tire revolution, the anticipation of which is not authorized by 
any appearances or by any sound reasoning, there can ne- 
ver exist a mediate condition between the complete subju- 
gation of the blacks, and the expulsion or destruction of the 
whites in the West Indias, nay in any country where such an 
adverse population is found. I know how little these posi- 
tions will be relished by some persons in this country, the 
only one whose approbation of what I write is essential to 
me ; but I cannot fawn for popularity, nor can I gild and 
sweeten phrases, when subjects are treated upon which relate 



77 

to the future destinies of a vast continent, and above all 
of my native land ; I write what I believe to be political 
truths; if they are disapproved, I have only to regret that the 
truth is unpalatable; and I have yet to learn that the enlight- 
ened and reasoning citizens of the United States will cen- 
sure the expression of what is believed to be truth, when it 
is not done in an offensive manner, without imputing impro- 
per motives to those whose opinions are different, and with- 
out disputing the right of every man to entertain his own 
sentiments ; a right which I concede as freely to others as I 
claim it for myself. 

The causes of the permanency of the colonial state of the 
West Indian islands are, the national divisions according to 
the several origins of the inhabitants of the islands, acknow- 
ledged however to be much modified by circumstances and 
past events and to be of itself alone an insufficient reason 
for their not being expected to unite into a confederated or 
consolidated independent nation ; and the peculiar character 
of the mass of their population, which we cannot hope will be 
blended into identity with the portion which rules, and which 
possesses the education, the talent, and the arms ; without 
which identity, compounded of feeling and interest, a nation 
cannot be constituted. Perhaps even these causes would not 
perpetuate their colonial condition, if the white inhabitants 
possessed great vigour and activity of mind and body ; in 
this case, reinforcing their numerical strength by connecting 
with themselves the interests, the pride, and the sympathy 
of the coloured or mulatto part of the population, and thus 
forming a middle class in society, they might be able to 
place themselves more nearly in the condition of the Eu- 
ropean nations in former ages. But the debilitating influ- 
ence of slavery upon the character of the islanders, vastly 
enhanced by the effect of a voluptuous climate, seems to 
forbid the conception of a plan which would require a de- 
velopment and constant exercise of the strongest energies 
of the mind, and also an exercise of great bodily activity. 
Important indeed, in commerce, politics, and the general 
affairs of the world, would be an insular nation composed 
of the West Indian islands, with a strong navy, and a large 
L 



78 

army occupying their numerous strong holds. Some data 
whereon to found reflections on this subject appear in the 
note*, in which I have placed a summary of the statistics of 
the West Indias as given by baron Humboldt, one of the 
most laborious and intelligent of modern writers : it is pro- 
bable that, as M. De Humboldt himself states, the calcula- 
tions may be only approximative ; but this is all that can be 
expected in political economy ; and when nations are counted, 
a few thousands more or less do not affect the general de- 
ductions from the data. 

There is one contingency under which an insular nation 
might be created in these regions. It is that of one or more 
of the most powerful nations of Europe, or of America, 
adopting the plan of forming the new nation, and constituting 
itself, or themselves, the protector of the new born empire, 
as in the instance of the Ionian isles, or resembling the for- 
mer state of colonial America. Some recent examples in 
Europe do not make this idea seem so visionary as it would 
have appeared fifty years ago. If such an event should 
happen, it is possible, that, after having been accustomed to 
a modified self government for a half century, secured 
from foreign violence and domestic insurrection by the as- 
sistance of the protecting power, the relations between the 
islands, and among the different classes of the inhabitants, 
might be cemented into a national consistency, and they 
might be qualified to take the forces of empire into the 
hands of their own government ; such would certainly be 
the ultimate destiny of the new nation, as it has been of 
every people separated by distance from its metropolitan 
government — excepting always the possibility of a new dis- 



* The whole surface of the Archipelago of the West Indies contains nearly 
8S00 square leagues, 20 to a degree, or 74,700 square miles. Total population 
2, 843,000 ; of which, whites, 482,600, or 17 per cent. Black and some mulatto 
slaves, 1,147,500, or 40 per cent. Free men of colour, mulattoes, and blacks, 
1,212,900, or 43 per cent. ; of the slaves the mulattoes are taken to be one-twen- 
tieth. Cuba, 700,000 souls, of which 256,000 are slaves. Haity, 820,000. Ja- 
maica, 402,000, of which 342,000 are slaves. — Humboldt's Personal Narrative, 
Vol. VI. Part II. English translation, 1826, (calculations brought down to 1824), 
pp.818. 834. 



79 

inemberment by conquest. To this idea (which has never met 
my eye before) is to be objected ; first, that it has not yet 
been broached in any country, as I believe ; secondly, that few 
governments are generous enough to assist in the creation of 
a new people, merely from a desire to obtain the glory of ad- 
ding a member to the great family of nations ; and thirdly, 
that the design would be opposed by the sovereigns who 
own the several colonies, as well as by those who would be 
jealous either of the power which must thence accrue to the 
protecting power, or of the glory to be acquired by such an 
act of magnanimity. At least, all things seem to indicate 
that the islands will remain colonies, owned by their pre- 
sent possessors, or by powers who will hereafter conquer 
only to bring them under their own yoke. No nation will 
take the trouble of fighting them free, and the discordant na- 
ture of their population will prevent their doing it for them- 
selves : and of course all precautionary measures should be 
taken by the two Americas with an expectation of the per- 
manency of the present condition of the islands. 

The existence of negro slavery, in a country where the 
blacks are numerous, is a thing not to be temporized with, to 
be alleviated, nor to be g6t rid of, by any contrivance as 
yet devised. The colours cannot be blended : the mixture of 
them only creates a new caste, which does not belong to 
either colour, with the bravery and fierceness of the white 
race before it was mollified by the effect of climate, with its 
intelligence and talent, and with the capability of enduring 
the climate which characterizes the black. This caste is the 
great implement in hands of the ascendant race for repress- 
ing any attempts of the slaves to acquire a superiority, for 
which nature never intended them, if we may judge by their 
condition and history in the countries whence they were 
originally brought, or by what we have seen of them with 
our own eyes in the countries where they now are. We 
have seen nations of tawny men formidable to the whites, 
and distinguished in the arts ; but we have no example of a 
black nation being distinguished for any thing but their bar- 
barism : they are slaves in their own land as much as they 
are elsewhere, and slaves there to barbarians of their own 



colour. If the mulatto race were any where to attempt to 
overpower the whites, a rancorous hostility against the mulat- 
toes would be found among the negroes, by means of which, 
with any reasonable policy, such an attempt might be re- 
pressed ; and in this case the negroes would fight better, be- 
cause the similarity of their origin and of their colour would 
preclude the natural sense of inferiority which they feel 
towards the whites, and which will always give the latter a 
decided superiority in the field, unless enormously outnum- 
bered. Thus, by means of the antipathy subsisting between 
the two colours, the white race, with any prudence, will 
always retain the mastery. 

As the condition ofa country wherein there are many blacks 
cannot be altered, there is no medium between slavery and 
extermination ; for if the slaves be set free they compose a mi- 
serable, idle, volatile, dangerous, and worthless population, as 
we have seen not only in the United States, but also in their 
boasted Haity. There does not appear to be danger of a suc- 
cessful insurrection of the blacks in any country where they 
are not many fold the number of the whites; nor even where 
this is the case, if the whites are not imprudent to the highest 
degree : by a slight attention to management, they may keep 
up the antipathy between the mulattoes and blacks, and use 
them mutually to keep down one another. There is only 
one event in which an imminent peril can occur; it is in 
case another nation, forgetting every law of nature and of 
religion, shall furnish arms to the slaves, with white or educa- 
ted mulatto leaders to head them; this crime of which some 
of the colonists accuse an enlightened nation, ought to be 
punished by putting any government capable of it, out of 
the pale of national law ; it should be placed on the footing 
of piracy by consent of all civilized countries, and instant 
death should be inflicted upon every person detected in at- 
tempting it The greatest misfortunes of inhabitants of the 
islands particularly, and of all people who own slaves, are 
the enervation and luxury produced by the condition itself 
of slave holding, by their riches, and by the climate. If the 
chivalric habits and propensities of the early age of Europe, 
when the body was nerved by martial exercises, could be 



81 

introduced among slave holders, they would be safe ; for 
experience teaches us that the white race is sure of con- 
quering in battle vastly superior numbers of blacks, and even 
of coloured men if these are not commanded by whites ; 
Hindostan affords proofs enough of the fact. The colonists 
ought to rely chiefly upon themselves, maintaining a military 
organization ready for instant concentration and action. A 
strong force of regular and standing troops, with the posses- 
sion of well constructed fortresses, incapable of capture but 
by regular sieges conducted according to the rules of art, are 
also necessary; with these and a military organization, as 
well as a martial spirit among themselves, the slave owners 
would always be safe ; although they may be liable to par- 
tial insurrections and violence more like offences against 
the police than formidable civil wars. But the unpardon- 
able offence against the whole white race, from which, if 
persisted in, the worst imaginable consequences must be 
anticipated, is the arming and disciplining the blacks. One 
nation has done this to a considerable extent as is before in- 
timated. It is all very well to exclaim against negro slavery, 
although how to get rid of it where slaves are numerous is 
a question not to be answered ; no man who has common 
humanity can extenuate cruelty towards them, but he who, 
under pretence of compassionating them and of fine feel- 
ings, should kindle the volcanic flames of servile wars against 
his own colour or his own countrymen, would deserve the 
most severe punishment, and would merit the concentra- 
ted execration of the world. He must want common 
sense, and is utterly destitute of the humanity which he pre- 
tends, who would provoke and exercise cruelty towards the 
whites, under the false colour of compassion for the blacks. 
The wretch, who unchains tygers and turns them loose upon 
a populous city, is kind, benevolent, humane, in comparison 
to him, accursed of his race and abandoned by a just God, 
who would set the poor uncultivated slave at his master's 
throat; the horror, ravage, slaughter, and devastation, conse- 
quent upon such an atrocity has had no parallel — let St 
Domingo bear witness. 

Although I do not believe that with proper precautions 



82 

the whites of the islands could be subdued by the blacks, 
yet no one can answer for the consequences of first educat- 
ing and rousing all the higher passions in the breasts of 
some blacks and especially of the mulattoes, who are scarcely 
inferior to ourselves in talents and courage, and who, by the 
unfortunate effects of unbridled luxury and the partiality of 
their white parents, are likely to be employed in the islands 
in posts of trust and to be the most carefully educated, and 
then embodying these blacks and mulattoes into armies and 
carefully disciplining them : some Spartacus will be found 
among them, who will scoff at the feeble, the paltry, expe- 
dient of setting white officers to command them. The first 
law of safety is to keep arms out of the hands of the blacks, 
or of any population which it is necessary to keep down, 
and to prevent their acquiring a familiarity with the use of 
arms ; the second is, to prevent the formation of a nucleus 
whereupon an insurrection may form, and which may bear 
the first brunt of attack in case of insurrection. ^ But the 
fearful plan of raising black troops, destroys both precau- 
tions; they are familiarized with arms, and they are the cen- 
tres round which the numerical force of their own colour 
may rally ; besides, they are, and must necessarily be, can- 
toned, quartered, or garrisoned in the strong holds and for- 
tresses: if they get possession of these, arms, stores, and 
all, the affair would be decided at once. Let it not delude 
any one that hitherto the black troops in those countries 
have been faithful ; the hour has not arrived, their leader, 
their Spartacus, has not appeared. Of all the fatal, of all the 
detestable, meJtsures of modern policy, this is the very worst; 
it is a cruelty, a barbarity, of the most direful aspect; the 
worse, because those who originated and who persevere in it 
are far removed from its dangers, to which one could be al- 
most reconciled if they were exposed to the hazard ; but it 
is not they, it is the colonists, who are thus laid open to 
every evil of which our nature is susceptible; upon their 
devoted heads will the tornado burst, while the men, the 
nation, and the government, which have prepared these 
horrors, are safe, remote, and indifferent spectators of the 
catastrophes which they have prepared. If black troops 



83 

must be levied, they ought to be removed instantly after their 
enrolment to Europe, where they will be innoctious, and re- 
placed in the islands by white troops. 

In considering the relations of the West Indias, Cuba is of 
sufficient importance to demand special observation. The 
first and most urgent point to discuss in regard to this island, 
is, whether it can or will be separately independent. I doubt 
its occupying this position. Cuba and Porto Rico have a 
superficies of 4430 square leagues according to Humboldt* 
who has deviated from his usual critical accuracy in not giv- 
ing the separate measurement of each, but Porto Rico does 
not enter into my consideration, as Haity interposes, to which 
in case of dismemberment, it is more likely to belong. Cuba 
contains 700,000 souls according to this author, of which 
256,000 are slaves, upon a superficies, according to my as- 
sumption, of 38,000 square miles. Now this population may 
double in about twenty-five years : but suppose there will be 
more than a million and a half of inhabitants, the ratio of po- 
pulation, would be three hundred and fifty-five and ten thirty- 
eighths souls to the square league, or thirty-nine and eighteen 
thirty-eighths to the square mile ; prolific as is the soil, it can- 
not be expected to produce aliment for a greater number than 
the relative population of France which is 1178 to the square 
leaguef , and to support them, the ground now occupied by 
plantations of the articles which constitute her riches, must 
then be converted into fields for cultivation of mere food ; of 
course diminishing her wealth and the sources of her public 
revenue : as to manufactures on a large scale for exportation. 



* Vol. I. Part I. p. 127. This number of square leagues equals 39,870 square 
miles. There is a curious discrepancy in the estimates of the area of these is- 
lands : Rees's Cyclopaedia gives for Cuba 38,400 square miles ; Darby's Edition of 
Brooks's Gazetteer, ed. 1823, 42,000 square miles for Cuba, and calls Porto Rica 
100 by 50 miles ; Morse's Universal Geography, 54,000 square miles for Cuba, and 
4140 for Porto Rico ; Melish's Geographical Description of the United States and 
the contiguous countries, ed. 1822, calls Cuba 54,000 square miles, and Porto 
Rico 4000. All calculations of the area of countries are merely approximation; 
therefore I assume the content of Cuba in the text as sufficiently correct for so 
general a treatise. 

t Humboldt, ut ante, Vol. VI. Part I. p. 197. 



84 

they can not be expected from an island under so hot a sun ; 
and a very long period must elapse before such a population 
as that last named, or any thing like it, can exist, if it ever 
can. If Haity should be cited to contradict the idea that 
Cuba is neither large enough, nor susceptible of population 
enough, to be entirely independent, I have only to reply 
that Haity holds her independence at the mere will of the 
great powers, and may be conquered in any six months by 
the first that shall undertake the task and can surmount the 
jealousy of rival sovereigns : if the 24,000 men sent out 
formerly by France for this purpose were not sufficient, 
50,000 would do the business ; and if such a body would be 
difficult to transport at once, they might be concentrated 
upon one of the other islands by successive embarkations. 
The stability of Haitian independence would not be worth 
six months' purchase if either England or France were to 
attempt seriously the subjugation of her inefficient popula- 
tion. 

A society of a million and a half of souls is not large 
enough to constitute a separate nation as the politics of the 
world stand : the example of the Scots, as brave, high minded, 
industrious, and intelligent, a people as the sun ever shone 
upon, is before our eyes, as proof of this position. 

But Cuba may easily form a confederated state with either 
of her powerful neighbours, the United States or Colombia ; 
she might do so with Mexico, but that she is almost too dis- 
tant : she so nearly touches the others that she would natu- 
rally be attached to one of them. The objection to such an 
union, strengthening and protecting both parties, will be 
found only in the jealousy of the European sovereigns, in 
their desire to prevent a coalition which would irretrievably 
seal the gulf of Mexico against any hostile invasion, and in 
their apprehension for the effect of an example of the kind, 
if they were to allow Spain to be deprived, either by con- 
quest or by purchase, of so important a colony. This how- 
ever is the destiny of Cuba, and probably at no distant day. 
Then will appear whether the above motives will be strong 
enough to counterbalance the jealousy which the powers of 



85 

Europe will feel towards each other in relation to any of 
them interfering in American affairs. 

It is in vain to use any circumlocution upon this subject — 
Cuba must be adopted into the great American family. If 
we could calculate with any reasonable certainty upon that 
island remaining in the possession of a power too weak to 
make use of it as a point whence to attack us or the other 
nations of this continent, and yet just strong enough to main- 
tain her dominion over it, or rather if we could suppose the 
power of the sovereign of the island sufficient to prevent 
any other European nation from getting it out of his hands, 
and yet not so strong as to prevent America from taking 
possession of it whenever we please — if we could suppose a 
thing impossible and absurd in itself, then we might regard 
Cuba with indifference. But as such an idea is absurd, we 
can not, and we ought not, to forget for an instant that Cuba 
is the hermetical seal to the mouth of the gulf, and that she 
stretches out a long flank of coast to that sea whose freedom 
and safety are indispensable to Colombia, and to our own 
trade with the great regions which form its continental out- 
line. The gulf could not be entered if Cuba were occu- 
pied by a strong naval power at variance with the nations 
whose territories circumscribe it ; nor could the sea south 
of her be then navigated, with any security. Therefore Cuba 
must not pass out of the possession of Spain into that of any 
other European power ; and as Spain is not strong enough 
to keep it, the island must be united to the American system. 
When she is united to that policy the gulf will be safe, for 
the grand rendezvous of the defensive fleets will be on her 
coasts, with a perfectly free option of contending for the en- 
trances into the gulf and into the sea south of her, or of 
fighting within them with friendly ports on all sides. This 
language may be called bold, if the whole theme upon 
which I write were not the vital interests of my own coun- 
try and of all America ; it might even be termed rash, were 
it not best to declare the whole truth to those for whom 
alone I write, however appalling it may be. 

The question immediately occurs, how is America to ob- 
tain Cuba, not with the design of perpetuating her colonial 
M 



86 

state, but of making her part of ourselves, a confederated 
state or nation. I will not speak of the ultima ratio regum, 
although a point of so much importance is worth the cost and 
the peril of war; but it is to be hoped that milder measures 
may obtain the same result. Spain will have to abandon 
in a short time her inveterate obstinacy respecting her late 
colonies ; they are lost to her for ever ; and the sooner she 
submits to the inflexible decrees of fate, the greater will be 
her prospect of sharing with the rest of the world in the ad- 
vantages of commercial relations with the new and rich 
countries whose trade is now thrown open to competition. 
She is at present overwhelmed with public debt; and, if she 
is wise, Cuba may be purchased from her at a price which will 
relieve her of a considerable part of her burthens, or which 
at least will give her some instant relief. To this plan the 
other powers of Europe ought not to oppose any objections ; 
because it cannot be for their well understood interest that 
the countries, from which they will derive vast resources, and 
with which they will have have an incalculable amount of 
trade, should be kept in a state of alarm and of war: while 
such a state of things exists, the late colonies cannot devote 
themselves fully to the production of the means of purchasing 
what Europe is prepared to supply to them; of course every 
hour of delay is an injury to the subjects of the only powers 
whose opposition is to be apprehended, or whose objections 
can be made good by force. They must also be convinced, 
by this time, of the truth of what has been so often stated 
by their politicians, that Spain will never occupy herself in 
increasing her internal resources so as to become an effi- 
cient member of the European system, which is necessary 
to their beau ideal of a balance of power, until she is com- 
pletely weaned from the delusions of her colonial dreams, 
and from the consequent desultory and impotent condition 
to which she is reduced. They are therefore directly inte- 
rested, even in order to strengthen the great features of 
European policy, in advocating, instead of opposing, a ces- 
sion of Cuba. 

But what are these arguments *? They are to shew that 



81 

wise men, good men (these are convertible terms) or generous 
men, would take pleasure in seeing a continent placed in a 
position which would insure its safety and peace, while 
an ample field would be opened for the exercise of all the 
grander human passions within its shores. Love of glory 
would find unbounded scope for action in the wide range 
presented by the numerous nations, now in the earliest stage 
of their youth : and where is there a glory comparable to 
that of improving society and of adding to the happiness of 
our species — so blest a glory — whose holocaust is the ho- 
mage of hearts "? Ambition, or desire of governing, will be, 
or ought to be, a desire of governing under the will and ac- 
cording to the inclination of the citizens of a country. Am- 
bition for the fame of strengthening and consolidating the 
power civil or military of a nation, has almost boundless 
opportunity for exercise in the new states — all the grand 
emotions in their best dictates, regulated by public will, and 
directed to public good, not those which lead men to sacri- 
fice their species to bloody and devastating personal tri- 
umphs — all will have, in the consolidated interests of the 
continent, abundant field for their display and their exercise; 
they will have sufficient employment at home to prevent 
their seeking it across the sea; they will make their own 
land powerful enough to resist foreign aggression, but the 
distances are too great for them to think of, and every other 
reason will dictate to them to abstain from, aggressions on 
Europe; indeed the strength of the countries will be re- 
quired to support the fabric of their own system, without 
any to spare for foreign outrage ; their strength applicable 
to foreign powers will only be that of resistance to attack. 
To these ought to be added the wish that the country, which 
would, at a first and contracted view, appear to suffer injury 
by the loss of a colony, should by this loss of an excres- 
cence be obliged to turn her undivided attention to her do^ 
mestic situation, and thus recover her station in the great 
family of nations, and re-establish the prosperity and happi- 
ness of her people. 

Such ideas as these would govern, if statesmen were truly 



wise; but ours is not the golden age, and we must take men 
as we find them : history shews us by precedent what we are 
to expect ; passions of a thousand ditTerent shades, and' in- 
terests of collective bodies and orders, or of mere indivi- 
duals, will continue to govern the world. Therefore, some 
powers will be jealous of the rising importance of Ame- 
rica, forgetting the living example before their eyes, in which 
they see that all Europe, and especially the country which 
was said fifty years since to have lost the brighest jewel 
in her diadem, has derived ten fold the wealth to indivi- 
duals and ten fold the revenue to her government by her in- 
tercourse with the United States that she ever obtained from 
them while they were her colonies. They will suppose then, 
that, if Spain is to part with Cuba, they might as well suc- 
ceed her in possession of it ; and they will oppose the acces- 
sion of that island to the American system. But opposition 
to the contrary notwithstanding, Cuba must belong to Amer- 
ica, and she will be amalgamated before many years expire. 
It may cost a war ; although, if Europe sees her own in- 
terest clearly, she will not resort to such an extremity. War 
or not war, Cuba must be American ; the interest and the 
welfare of a continent demand it. 

Let me for a moment collate some facts. At the congress 
of Panama were assembled the most powerful of the Hispano- 
American states; certain treaties were concluded there, of 
which an outline was published ; and certain secret articles 
or treaties were also made. The proceedings appear to 
have been of two great importance to be entrusted to com- 
mon messengers ; this is a fair inference, for one of the min- 
isters of each party carried them home to their respective 
, governments. England was represented at the congress, or 
at least she had a commissioner on the spot; and judging from 
her course of diplomacy, she must have penetrated the se- 
cret of the private articles. The United States were not 
represented then, in consequence of the death of one of the 
envoys, and the absence of the other in consequence of no- 
body knows what The effect of the United States not be- 
ing represented at the congress, however, has been that we 



89 

eould not know the nature of the secret conventions ; at 
any rate we could not know them with the same certainty 
that the Enghsh government does ; we must therefore infer 
their tenor from circumstances. 

A report was universally prevalent for some time preceding 
the congress, which seemed to be countenanced by various 
expressions of public documents of the Hispano-American 
governments, and which was corroborated by the evident 
and natural interest of those states ; the rumour was, that 
an invasion of Cuba would be made by the confederated 
forces of the new states. Our own president gave cre- 
dence and currency to the idea, by stating as one of his 
motives for sending commissioners to the congress, that he 
wished to influence the parties to abstain from such a de- 
sign. The absence of any representative of the United States, 
after the violent discussions last winter upon the subject, 
certainly afforded to the congress at Panama a pretext, and 
no slight grounds for a real belief, that we were not very 
much in earnest about any of the objects that were talked 
of as being intended by us : therefore, after waiting a most 
unreasonable time, the conferences were opened, and va- 
rious treaties concluded, among which were the secret con- 
ventions. Previously, and during at the time the congress 
was assembling, several movements, directed towards the 
coast, took place among the troops of the parties, which all 
the world said were preparatory to the invasion of Cuba ; and 
what all the world says, although it may be mistaken in de- 
tails, has always some foundation in fact. These movements 
were suspended, for which the reasons are perfectly mani- 
fest, they were the disturbances in Lima, and in Venezuela. 
At a distance we only hear of such things after they break 
out* J but a watchful government on the spot sees the germs 



* The dates are as follows : the first explosion in Venezuela was at Valencia 
on the 30th of April 1826 ; Paez's first proclamation, on the 3d of May : the 
conspiracy in Peru, in which admiral Guisse and general Necochea were impli- 
cated, was discovered on the 28th July : and the disturbances in Guatemala broke 
out in June : and those in the southern part of Mexico appeared nearly 

at the same time. If these conspiracies had not a common origin, they exhibit 
the most remarkable coincidence in historv. 



90 

when they only begin to sprout : this accounts for the sus- 
pension of the movements of the troops before most of us 
in this country were informed of the approaching uneasiness. 
It even appears possible that the squadron sent round by 
Chili, which must have sailed from the shore of the Pacific 
at nearly the period when the other military movements be- 
gan, was intended as much to serve for an accessary to the 
grand design as for an augmentation of the force of Bue- 
nos Ayres. Isolated facts, when brought together, as- 
sume a marked significancy. Spain is indebted to England 
many millions, and has been pressed more than once to ar- 
range this debt ; not long ago, at about the time when the 
invasion of Cuba was most talked of, it was said that Eng- 
land threatened to pay herself, if Spain did not meet her 
demands : almost concurrently with this report came out 
another, that Spain was about to commit for a time the cus- 
tody of Cuba to one of the great European powers, and 
France was indicated as being the one intended. Spain 
however was very soon said to be making great exertions to 
reinforce Cuba ; troops and ships actually came out. As 
soon as the congress of Panama adjourned, with the view 
of meeting at Tacubaya, Mr Dawkins the British envoy 
sailed for England : there was just time for him to arrive to 
make his communications, for the cabinet to determine upon 
its course, and for the intelligence to reach us, when another 
report, which has been current within a few days of my wri- 
ting this sentence, reaches us, that England is about to take 
possession of Cuba. While all these transactions are on 
foot, England betrays more and more jealousy of our rela- 
tions with the colonies ; exhibiting it in the negociations 
now broken off, with respect to her own possessions ; and 
now it appears that our affairs with her are in a very 
ticklish posture ; this appears not only by the communi- 
cations to congress, and by her recent proclamation, but 
also by her presses which seem to be trying to excite the 
feelings of her people against us by the revival of almost 
forgotten subjects of discussion, by the acrimonious censure 
of our proceedings in regard to some of the yet unexecuted 
articles of our treaties with her, and by exclaiming against 



91 

our general conduct as well as the designs they attribute to 
us*. All these reports are familiar to the whole community 
and have run the rounds of our gazettes ; I am not one of 
those political " quid nuncs" who see cause of alarm in 
every idle rumour, nor do I fancy that the above have been 
perfectly correct in all their details : but as state secrets 
almost always break out, as the enumerated reports have 
obtained universal currency, and as they have a remarkable 
coincidence, not only with each other, but also with those 
things which we know to be facts from official documents or 
publications, I am led irresistably to the conclusion that 
there have been, or do exist, some considerable grounds for 
them, that the matters to which they refer have been seriously 
discussed in high quarters, and that various projects of simi- 
lar nature have been entertained, particularly in Spain and 
in England, for the purpose of preventing Cuba from being 
united to the American system, and for either preserving her 
in her present condition, or for placing her in the hands of 
a power better able than Spain to defend the possession ; 
finally, I infer that it is a settled determination abroad that 
Cuba shall still be European, and that the mouth of the 
Mexican gulf shall continue to be guarded against American 
interests ; the coincidence of so many facts and reports, which 
do not strike one until they are brought together into one 
view, oblige my mind to come to such conclusions. It is 
almost certain that Cuba will have to be fought for some 
day or other ; but it will be a curious event if the contest 
arrives so soon, and with a power to which she does not be- 
long. 

Does there exist any where a desire to monopolize the 
West Indian islands "? The Dutch, Danish, and Swedish 
islands contain a population of 84,500 souls, of which 61,300 
are slaves ; viz. St Eustache and Saba, St Martin, Curacoa, 
St Croix, St Thomas, St John, St Bartholomew; the French 
islands 219,000, of which 178,000 slaves, viz. Guadeloupe 
and its dependencies St Maria Galante, La Desiderade, and 
part of St Martin's and Martinique ; the Spanish islands 



This sectioa was written in December. 



92 

943,000, of which 281,400 slaves, viz. Cuba and Porto Rico, 
Marguerita which is included by Humboldt in these numbers 
now is Colombian and has ! 5,000 inhabitants*; the English 
islands 776,500, of which 626,800 slaves, viz. Jamaica, Bar- 
badoes, Antigua, St Kitts, Nevis, Grenada, St Vincent, and 
the Grenadines, Dominica, Montzerat, the Virgin isles, Ane- 
gada. Virgin Gorda, and Tortola, Tobago, Anguilla, and 
Barbuda, Trinidad, St Lucie, the Bahama islands : the ano- 
maly Haity containing 820,000, of which 30,000 are whitesf . 
This list I think answers the question. 

If the islands are to be absorbed by an overweening 
power, the necessity of adding Cuba to the American sys- 
tem is becoming doubly imperious ; Trinidad ought also to 
be attached, in order to complete the defence of the gulf 
and the Caribbean sea. 



CHAPTER XL 



F 



ROM the W^est Indies let us return to South America. 
So little is known in this country with certainty or in de- 
tail about Guatemala, or the republic of central America, 
that I cannot pretend to speculate in relation to it. All I 
will say is, that their condition, their form of government, in- 
stitutions, and future destiny, must be materially influenced 
by the attitudes of Mexico and of Colombia. The govern- 
ment of Guatemala will no doubt surmount its present dif- 
ficulties, and the state of society is not more irregular than 
is to be expected in a country whose independence is so new. 



* Noticia sobre la Geografia Politica de Colombijt, p. 16. 
t I refer again to Humboldt, Vol. VI. Part II. 



93 

The utmost population which I have seen assigned to this con- 
federation is 1,800,000; but it appears to be probable that it 
does not much exceed 1,200,000: placed between Mexico 
and Colombia there can be little doubt of the inclination 
of the government and inhabitants, as there is none of her 
interest and of her destiny, to be united to the general sys- 
tem of America. 



CHAPTER XII. 



C 



OLOMBIA, in 1823, contained 2,785,000 souls, equal to 
thirty to the square league, or more probably 2,900,000* ; at 
this date it is likely that the population is above 3,000,000; 
the Exposicion que el Secretario de Estado del despacho del 
interior, &c. to the congress of 1 826, p. 1 5, speaks of the 
population at 3,000,000f . The population of Venezuela was, 
in 1822, 785,000 J, or twenty-three souls to the square league. 
Of the total of 2,785,000, Humboldt calculates the whites 
to be only 642,000, the Indians 720,000, and the mixed 
races 1,256,000; the blacks he does not specifically distin- 
guish, but from the above numbers they would be 167,000; 
and yet he assigns only 387,000 to the whole of continental 
Spanish America^. I am obliged to doubt the exact accu- 
racy of these calculations, again protesting that I almost feel 



* Humboldt, Vol. VI. Part I. p. 127. 

t But by Noticia sobre la Geografia Politica de Colombia, &c. ed. Bogota, 
1825, pp. 3. 47. the population is given at 2,700,000 souls, equal to 29 per square 
league. , 

t There is a singular discrepancy between Humboldt and the Noticia sobre h 
Creografia, on this eniimeration. See note in page 104. 

§ Humboldt, Part H. pp. 835, 836. 

N 



94 

myself wrong whenever I differ from him. He estimates the 
area of the territory of the republic at 91,952 square ma- 
rine leagues, of which Venezuela 33,701*. 

This vast republic, whose territory is equal to much more 
than the half of the entire territory of the United States, to 
more than one and a third times that of Mexico, and whose 
population is more than half the average of ours per square 
league, abounding in or capable of yielding every commodity 
which can make a nation rich, with a long extent of sea coast, 
is certainly destined to occupy a distinguished position in the 
human family. The character of its inhabitants, or at least 
of that portion of them which appears to possess, and which 
no doubt will retain, the ascendancy, the whites, seems to 
be marked with as strong features as any of the Hispano- 
American people; the whole course of the revolutionary 
contest among them, and even the effervescences which have 
taken place in the country, corroborate this idea ; and for 
some time past it has attracted the largest share of public 
attention : it has also taken the lead in the most important 
question that ever occupied America and the world; no 
slight proof this of the vigour of Colombian intellect, that 
it should have emanated from the gigantic mind of one great 
man born on her soil, who is not contented with having 
hewn out her independence with his sword at the head of 
her brave citizens, but who extends his magnificent ambition 
to the permanent establishment of her prosperity. 

The greater part of the political considerations which 
were dwelt upon in speaking of Mexico, apply to Colombia; 
it will not be necessary to repeat them. But the great point 
for our meditation is the permanency of her government. I 
approach this subject with that apprehension which must 
arise in a writer's breast when he attempts to prognosticate 
the destinies of a nation while unfavourable rumours are 
afloat, and while there is an actual excitement existing in 
the country, which may possibly contradict his conclusions 
before his sheets pass through the press. What is written 



Humboldt, Part I. p. 160. See also Noticia sobre la Geogiafia, &c. p. 45. 



95 

may turn out to be erroneous ; but it must be risked, relying 
upon the general accuracy of the data, collated with some 
labour, leaving the demonstration of the correctness of the 
inductions to future events, and to the judgment of my rea- 
ders. 

I do not consider the disturbances in Colombia as likely to 
terminate either in the dismemberment of the nation or in 
the overthrow of the government. There is a natural cohe- 
sion among the inhabitants of each of the former viceroyal- 
ties, which constitutes a national identity, and which can be 
dissevered by nothing short of conquest. The same feeling 
existed in the United States, and constituted the real demar- 
kation between the cidevant colonies. A tendency to direct 
their views towards the same metropolis, a concentration 
of those who have business with the government at the same 
points, a frequent and familiar intercourse brought about by 
these causes, habits of business together also induced by 
them, and a consequent connection of interest, all combined, 
create that kind of sympathy which unites masses of men 
into nations. We cannot at once reconcile to our habits of 
thinking in this country (where we are accustomed to regard 
the former provinces as distinct states) the strong cohesion 
of the different provinces of the late viceroyalties; and we 
seem to look for it as a thing to be expected, that the pro- 
vinces should be states like our own; but in order to follow 
our example to the letter, the different viceroyalties would 
be separate states, as in fact they now are ; they formerly 
bore the same relation to one another that we did in our 
colonial condition, separately governed, and with no other 
immediate bond of connection than the common, but indivi- 
dual, allegiance to the same sovereign. Our position would 
probably be now different if the plan proposed in the year 
1754 of a confederation, among the then colonies, had been 
adopted by them and by the British government, or if it had 
created a governor general here, as in India, and if such ar- 
rangements had endured for some twenty or fifty years. If 
the whole of Spanish America were to form one grand con- 
federation, retaining the local governments of the several 
states, the parallel with our institutions would be complete. 



96 

We might as well expect the different counties of our states 
to assume the shape of independent but allied powers, as to 
anticipate such events from the different provinces of the 
late viceroyalties ; the political or governmental divisions 
were not more strongly marked in the one case than in the 
other, nor do the amounts of population differ so widely as to 
render the comparison inapplicable. Mexico and the late 
captain generalship of Guatemala have closely imitated our 
forms it is true, but it remains to be seen whether, in spite 
of the extent of the regions they cover, it would not have 
been better for them to govern themselves by means of one 
general congress, in place of subjecting themselves to the 
enormous expense and other inconveniences of many distinct 
legislatures. In this country it was impossible that any thing 
else could take place ; we were already separated into dis- 
tinct governments, as the Spanish Americas into viceroyal- 
ties, and it is always impossible to change suddenly the 
habits, dispositions, modes of thinking, or prejudices of a peo- 
ple. The great Peter incurred the greatest hazard when he 
commanded his subjects to shave thernselves, and the Sultan 
would lose his head if he were to attempt to force his subjects 
to wear tight clothing ; one of his predecessors did actually 
lose his life in consequence of his undertaking to put his Jani- 
zaries or the Bostangies into something like European uni- 
forms and to form their line of battle like men of sense. If such 
trifles could convulse nations, how absurd would it be to at- 
tempt to do violence to the prejudices of the people in the fun- 
damental principles of government. In order to change them, 
a long time, and the actual presence of an overpowering force 
at the commencement, are requisite. The identity or indivi- 
duality of nations is changed with much greater difficulty; 
many ages elapsed before the Saxons and the Gauls lost their 
nationality in their countries and formed each one nation with 
their conquerors ; we have seen Lorain a foreign country in 
France, almost to our own day ; we now see Scotland a 
separate nation, after an hundred and ten years of union with 
England, and more than two hundred since the race of Fer- 
gus the first began to wear the triple crown. And Ireland is 
yet a conquest, and has no national identity with England. 



97 

As every act, since the breaking out of the revolution in 
Spanish America, has demonstrated that those countries 
which now form the different nations are nations in sentiment, 
in feeling, and in prejudice, I infer that there is very little room 
to apprehend the dismemberment of any of them. The very 
circumstance that Guatemala and Buenos Ayres have been 
divided into separate states, the former in confederation, and 
the latter having been incessantly in dispute with some of 
the provinces and having had Paraguay and the Banda Ori- 
ental separated from her, proves my position ; their want of 
national coherence arises from these viceroyalties having 
had some of their provinces annexed to them at different 
times, and in some instances separated from them and then 
reunited, as suited the views of the Spanish government. 
Thus, not having been ab initio consolidated governments, 
they never acquired national consistency. It would swell 
this memoir too much to give a history of these changes, 
which are familiar to those who have paid attention to the 
annals of Spanish America ; I will therefore only point out 
the most remarkable case to support my reasoning, which is 
that of Paraguay, now as much independent of the govern- 
ment of Buenos Ayres, as it was under its first priestly mas- 
ters before it was united to the late viceroyalty ; indeed the 
instance is the stronger, because Paraguay has reverted to an 
isolation for which its first government gave the example. 
I instance also the Banda Oriental, which has been the sub- 
ject of dispute between Spain and Portugal from its first set- 
tlement. 

Colombia then will not be separated. It may be that 
some change from the present form may take place in the 
administration of the local concerns of the late provinces or 
capitancias generates, but it appears to me that even if cabil- 
dos or juntas in the several provinces were to be endowed 
with considerable powers in relation to local concerns (and 
I am persuaded this will be the utmost extent of any altera- 
tions) the nationality, the cohesion of the people, are too 
deeply rooted to be eradicated by any events within the 
scope of probability. The late disturbances in Venezuela bear 
the impress on their front of mere desire for personal aggran- 



98 

dizement of one or two individuals, or of personal and indi- 
vidual discontent of one or two chieftains. This is evident 
from the very outside of the affair, and it is confirmed by 
private anecdotes and information to which it is not for me 
to give publicity : if a person is said to be discontented with 
not having the position in the government assigned to him 
to which he supposes the agency he had in the cabinet work 
of the revolution entitles him, or if another is said to find it out 
of his power to make up his public accounts with any degree 
of accuracy, or to pay over the balances against him, or to ac- 
count for their loss by any excusable reason ; if such causes as 
these are assigned for some of the movements, far be it from me 
to "give them a local habitation and a name." The recent 
proceedings in Venezuela attracted considerable attention : 
but it certainly is a curious idea to infer that those proceed- 
ings have the sanction of the people's inclination and will, 
when Caraccas at first refused to join in the designs which 
were said to be popular and adopted by general consent in 
other places, in consequence of which the ostensible chief of 
the insurrection marched upon the town with a considerable 
number of troops ; in order to render the project popular I 
suppose ; then this chief earnestly advised the city to adopt 
the plan proposed, and it was so adopted, by acclamation. 
This is the drollest way of making a thing popular that has 
been yet devised ; we have heard of various modes of soli- 
citation and of coaxing, but coaxing with the bayonet is 
something entirely out of the common line. Nevertheless, 
whatever, or whoever, may be popular, there is a popularity 
throughout Colombia, manifested in every act and proclaimed 
in every paper, which is paramount to every other ; it is the 
dearly purchased and well deserved popularity of Bolivar, 
on whose valuable life the destinies of Colombia most essen- 
tially depend. It seems necessary in the great emergencies 
of nations, that public sentiment should be concentrated to 
one point and directed by one individual, upon whose intelli- 
gence and virtue, or the want of them, hangs the future 
situation of the country, its happiness and prosperity, or the 
reverse : and heaven appears always to raise up at the crisis 
some one to be an instrument in its hands ; history is full of 



99 

such men, the Tells, the Washingtons, the Bolivars, who 
emancipated countries ; nor will posterity forget him who 
rescued his country from the most horrible condition into 
which a civilized nation could fall ; posterity will say that 
Napoleon was one of those instruments of heaven which are 
necessary in the critical moments of nations, in the agony of 
revolutions — posterity will say so, even when it acknow- 
ledges that he forced his beautiful France on to her welfare 
with too strong a hand, and that he sacrificed other nations 
by hecatombs to her glory — but where is the man who would 
not sacrifice the earth to his country *? The engine of go- 
vernment in Colombia was in operation with considerable 
regularity for some time ; long enough to extend the liga- 
ments of society and the communications of the authorities 
very generally through the community : this being the case, 
the persons at the head of affairs may be changed, but their 
places will be supplied by fresh individuals, who will have 
the same interests and the same views as their predecessors, 
when they are established in the preeminence. Man is the 
same always ; there must be a head to every society, in Caffra- 
ria as in Rome ; the name of the ofllice and the occupant 
may be changed, but the substance remains the same ; call 
it khan, chief, or Caesar, it it is still the head of the govern- 
ment : the modification of power is the result of the mode of 
thinking of the people; and of course it would be as impossi- 
ble for a mortal man to be a tyrant among us, by whatever 
empty title he might be styled, as it would be for a Turk to 
be a republican : the whole moral constitution of the people 
must undergo a complete metamorphosis first ; it is possible 
for divine providence to work this by a miracle, or that a com- 
bination of causes might produce it in the lapse of a long 
period ; but nothing else could effect it. Therefore whatever 
be the nature of the powers ascribed by the general disposi- 
tion of a people to its magistracy, those powers will be pos- 
sessed by the persons in authority, how often so ever 
the occupants may be changed. The only difficulty in ap- 
plying these axiomata to real life is in discovering what is 
really the disposition of the great majority of the people, and 



100 

upon this point men will differ as long as they do not all see 
through the same eyes. 

The data which have been enumerated are sufficient to 
convince myself, although I cannot answer for their having 
the same effect upon others, that the people at large of Co- 
lombia are not disposed to change the fundamental princi- 
ples of their government, which therefore possesses the prin- 
ciple of fundamental durability : although it may and most 
probably will be remodelled in some of the details, and per- 
haps it may temporarily assume some appearances which at 
first view may seem to indicate a very considerable change 
of system ; but I do not believe that in its essence, in its 
vital principles, it will be essentially different from its actual 
state : for if they should have a nominal dictator for a time, 
I do not believe that the disposition of the people would 
permit him to be a tyrant, still less do I believe that Bolivar, 
the only man who could be dictator, would be a tyrant under 
any circumstances. 

Is this government, or will it be, republican, democratic 9 
No; not according to the signification we affix to these terms. 
Can it be imagined that there can exist any thing like an ac- 
tual equality of rights, privileges, and of eligibility to office 
in a nation of 642,000 whites with the greatest part of them 
arms in their hands, certainly very brave, the descendants of 
the conquerors, with all their recollections fresh of their su- 
premacy, with all the prejudices and pride of the nobility 
of their colour, as De Pradt calls it — of about 170,000 ne- 
groes, of 720,000 Indians, and of 1,256,000 of mixed races, 
with the education almost exclusively confined to the whites, 
and by no means general among them. It is impossible that 
such a country should be democratic at present, there are 
too many means of defence in hands of the superior class j 
the discordancy of the colours is a most important barrier, 
since with mere ordinary tact the whites could always array 
the other colours against one another ; the habits of obe- 
dience, the custom, which has hardened into a disposition^ 
among the whites themselves to follow a chief and to range 
themselves under his banners, is another formidable impedi- 
ment to the establishment of democracy. Any republic in 



101 

Colombia, until a considerable time elapses, and until edu- 
cation and information diffuse themselves much more gene- 
rally than at present, will be upon the model of a Spartan 
republic — which, in spite of the glittering deceptions thrown 
over it by our school studies, was not a democracy. But 
Colombia will enjoy very liberal institutions ; all the great 
immunities of society will be faithfully and powerfully main- 
tained ; life, liberty, and property, of the poor, or of the infe- 
rior classes, whether black or of the mixed colours, will 
be defended from aggressions of the rich or dominant, as 
much as they can be in any form of government ; for in any 
country a bold bad man, having acquired the affection of the 
majority of those who reside around him, may commit acts 
of individual outrage which are difficult to punish ; the at- 
tachment of his neighbours alone is adequate to shield him : 
but in Colombia there will be a strong protection of the first 
classes against encroachments of the others. The habitual 
deference of the other colours to the whites, and the clan- 
nish disposition, or rather the vestiges of feodal prejudices 
among the whites, will tend to preserve the present condition 
of society. As to equality in the distribution of offices, it 
will follow the same course ; the prejudice or sentiment of 
inferiority among the subordinate castes, and the habit of 
command, as well as the natural cohesion among the domin- 
ant colour, will, without recurrence to the letter of the laws, 
prevent the superiority of the whites, and of the chiefs among 
that colour, from being subverted. Nothing but time, accom- 
panied by sedulous cultivation of generally diffiised educa- 
tion, can efface these prejudices, with their consequences ; 
and it remains to be proved whether those, who have now 
the ascendant, will contribute to and seriously promote such 
operations ; knowing, as they must, that their result will be 
to diminish the predominancy of the present ruling colour. 
The laws and professions of the magistracy are, it is true, 
favourable to a change in the relative condition of the diffe- 
rent castes ; but these are not enough, unless they are cor- 
dially supported by the dispositions of the people at large, 
and especially of that part of it which has now the ascendan- 
cy. There will arise, no doubt, many conspicuous, popular, 
O 



102 

influential, and powerful individuals among the subordinafie 
castes, who will force their way into power, or who will be 
placed there by those who possess it, but as soon as they 
have entered, their interests will become identified with those 
of (he persons who compose the magistracy, and they will 
of course make common cause with them ; so that the ad- 
vancement of a man of colour, whether of the Indian or of 
the African race, will not be the elevation of his caste, it 
will only be an exception in his favour ; it will not be the 
advancement of a class, but only of an individual. There- 
fore I have no idea that there will be a chance, for a long 
time, of an equality in the distribution of offices among the 
castes in Colombia, any more than there would be in our 
Southern states : for, although the subordinate colours are 
technically and legally free in Colombia, the prejudices of 
colour are nearly as strong there as in our country ; we have 
seen here some very distinguished individuals proud of their 
descent from the caciques of the aborigines, justly feeling 
themselves doubly American from that circumstance ; but 
nevertheless the Indian tribes have no political importance ; 
it is the talent, the personal influence, and the connections of 
those individuals which have taken them out of their caste, 
which has not been raised with them in the scale of political 
importance. Thus will it be in Colombia. 

It has been said that if she is not to be truly democratic- 
she might as well have been spared her revolution, and has 
not gained much by her emancipation from Spain. But I 
can not agree with this; even if one is to be tyrannized over, 
it is surely better to have a tyrant at home than to be slaves 
to a tyrant abroad : it is certainly better for the people that 
the revenues of the country should be spent among them al- 
though they were spent extravagantly, instead of being 
drained from them to enrich a country a thousand leagues 
ofl". But I have no idea that such a fate is reserved for Co- 
lombia ; on the contrary I have perfect faith that it is out of 
the question while Bolivar lives; he will not be a tyrant; and 
there is no other man in the country at present who has 
popularity or personal influence enough to be one in case of 
Bolivar's death : the influence of the prominent characters 



103 

is not sufficiently universal ; it is too local, or confined to 
particular parties, to enable any one of them to seize upon 
the reins of government with an absolute hand, even suppo- 
sing, which I do not, that the people were prepared for it. ■ 
Bolivar is evidently the only man to whom the whole coun- 
try looks up, and who possesses its unlimited and universal 
confidence, and he is too great to be a tyrant. 

Colombia will continue to be republican, in as much as it 
will be governed by laws, enacted by a representative legis- 
lature, and administered by a judiciary independent of the 
executive. The representation, as is evident from what has 
been said above, will not be what we call in this country 
purely democratic ; because it will not be elected by uni- 
versal suffrage ; a considerable portion of the population is 
not ready for this kind of government, it wants the requisite 
education and information, and the minds of the individuals 
have not yet been sufficiently disciplined. Qualifications 
for the electoral privileges will therefore be adopted, by 
which the rights of suffrage will be confined very much to 
that part of the population which is, or is supposed to be, 
prepared to exercise it with discretion; and probably quali- 
fications for office will be required, by which the choice 
will be restricted to those who are from their situation in 
society, or who ought to be, the best educated and the best 
informed. 

As to the chief of the executive branch, the office will no 
doubt be invested in, or continued to be bestowed upon 
Bolivar as long as he lives, or as long as he will choose to 
retain it; and I have no fear of his abusing the trust. The 
executive will unquestionably be clothed with much more 
strength than ours. To cause this every thing will combine; 
the ancient prejudices of the country accustomed to a despo- 
tic regime ; the singular mixture of the population, demand- 
ing the restraint of a vigorous administration; the extent 
of the territory whose limits are hardly to be reached by a 
weak arm ; the novelty of their institutions, and the conse- 
quent difficulty of executing the laws or of protecting either 
persons or property in a country affording so many facilities 
for escaping from punishmentj and among a people just set 



104 

free, just feeling themselves so, after having been for ages 
habituated to the peremptory exercise of absolute power, 
without having been schooled and prepared for the immea- 
surable change. At the same time, the population has be- 
come so inured to war, so much familiarized with resistance, 
they are so generally armed, and their character appears to 
be imbued with so much excitability, added to the daily in- 
creasing consciousness of the social importance of indivi- 
duals, that they would be very apt to repell any thing which 
savoured of wanton and despotic abuse of authority. The 
scenes which were lately acting in various parts of the coun- 
try tend much to confirm these ideas, since we see that the 
popular pretence for them was the mere want of sufficient 
participation in the government by particular districts, which 
in the present state of the nation is certainly going far to 
discover some excuse for insurrection; and whatever maybe 
the secret causes of the discontent of the chiefs of a popular 
commotion, they are always obliged to throw out some cap- 
tivating lure to the mass of the people to induce their fol- 
lowing them into the field. These disturbances I do not 
consider as threatening a dissolution of the government, much 
less a dismemberment of the country. Venezuela and 
Guayaquil*, with one or two less considerable provinces, have 
neither the numerical nor the moral strength that would be 
necessary to produce these results; Cundinamarcaf and the 
provinces which adhere to her are much more than a match 
for those which are discontented, if the question would re- 
quire force to decide it; besides, the army is considerable, 
has seen so much service that it must be in a pretty good 
state of discipline, and is faithful to the government, except 
the small portion of it which was under the immediate orders 
of Paez : added to which is the mighty name of Bolivar, him- 
self a host. But the thing is manifestly decided ; the discon- 
tented provinces have invoked him and have bestowed upon 
him absolute power over themselves, while he is the actual 



* Venezuela, 350,000, Guyaquil, 90,000 inhabitants. Noticia sobre la Geo- 
grafia, &c. 
t 371,000 inhabitants, ibid. 



105 

as well as the titular head of the government recognized by 
the constitution; and he comes forth in his usual unequivo- 
cal manner, he throws himself, his vast influence and popu-* 
larity, and what is the conclusive argument, like Brennus in 
the Capitol, he throws his powerful sword into the scale; 
but, more prudent than the rash Gaul, his explanation is not 
woe to the conquered ; he adopts the safer and more humane 
course of conciliation and of compromise. Some palliatives 
will be applied to assuage the discontents, some of the in- 
surgent chiefs will be bought off with gold or with honours, 
or will be crushed under the wheels of his triumphal car, 
which is drawn by the people, and the disturbances will be 
appeased*. We must not be surprised if that population, 
which have been constantly engaged in war for fifteen years 
and which have arms in their hands, should adopt a mode of 
expressing their sentiments a little more expeditious and a 
little more peremptory than we are accustomed to; if we 
were discontented, we should hold sundry town and county 
meetings, whereat a quantity of very long speeches would 
be made, and very furious resolutions passed ; it may be that 
we should abuse one another a trifle, particularly in the pa- 
pers; but people who have been fighting for so long a time, 
who have got so much used to it and whose weapons are 
not laid aside, would naturally manage things differently; 
they would perhaps have a meeting or two of a couple of 
hundred persons, make some short declarations of opinion, 
and put the vote; when, if the military liked the complexion 
of the orators, they would fire a few times up and down the 
streets; if not, they have nothing to do but to fire two or 
three volleys upon the rhetoricians, and the question would 
be decided. This argumentum ad hominem or ad corpus 
may strike our ideas as being somewhat dogmatical and 
rather at variance with the ordinary rules of logic; but it 



* Since this was written the question has been decided, peace has been re- 
stored, and Bolivar has tendered his resignation ; whether it be accepted or not, 
these proceedings prove the positions assumed in the text ; if it be not accepted 
his popularity will be again ratified by the popular will, since he has put it into the 
people's power to resume the trust if they choose. 



106 

should be remembered that force is an evil which generally 
cures itself, and that although there would be a very different 
state of things if the regular army alone decided every thing, 
yet as almost all the people have military habits, the same 
manner of acting which produces some violent disturbances, 
also guaranties them from the imposition of any form of 
government which has not the sanction of the will of the 
majority. 

The state of affairs at present is however by no means 
agreeable; there are discontents at home, and a foreign war 
is still pending, at the moment that a grand design is in 
agitation for consolidating American independence. Such 
a crisis demands extraordinary vigour, extraordinary mea- 
sures. What will these measures be"? Several of the pro- 
vinces have called upon their liberator to assume a dicta- 
torship; they have called upon him in the most moving and 
a,ffectionate terms; salvam fac rempublicam has been their 
united prayer. Old Rome gave them the original precedent, 
as well as examples of moderation to the dictator, and their 
common safety has been the urgent motive for their appeal- 
ing to him who made them free, for protection against anar- 
chy, and against intestine war. I believe he will accept 
this eminent trust, if he finds that the dissensions are not 
otherwise to be appeased, he has already assumed the ex- 
traordinary powers with which the constitution invests the 
president in extreme cases ; and again I say I have no fear 
that he will abuse it* : his fame is too great to admit the 
formation of such a fear. He is too greatly ambitious ; he 
has not the common ambition of being the founder of a 
dynasty; he aspires to the rarer glory of founding a republic, 
of refusing a crown : besides, he has no children to whom 
he might bequeath it. He has the power of a monarch, and 
it will last for his life, without any of the carking cares and 
envy that wait upon an acquired royalty ; his is an empire over 



* These anticipations have become realities in Paez's affair ; and I can only 
prove by my publisher and by friends who read the manuscript, that it was writ- 
ten before the disturbance in Venezuela was terminated. 



107 

the affections of his fellow citizens ; this is evident in every 
public act, and the attachment of the people will revert to 
his family connections ; he has a large fortune of his own, 
and may have any revenue he desires, of course he will be 
surrounded by all the splendour and state that riches can 
procure, without the censure and privation of ease that 
kings have often to encounter; his recommendation and 
influence do and will place his friends in the offices he 
wishes for them; what more can a monarch require, how 
few of them can command as much "? A man like him can 
not be contented with the throne of a single country, the 
admiration and esteem of a world are his thrones. Bolivar 
will not abuse his dictatorship; he has been appointed to 
one and has abandoned it, convening a national representa- 
tion, and giving a constitution which was adopted by those 
whom the people (who have paid him the glorious compli- 
ment of assuming his name) empowered to legislate for 
them : he has long possessed a virtual dictatorship in his own 
country ; for his advice has had the force of laws. But he 
will do what he believes the condition of his country re- 
quires, and he will act more emphatically, more energeti- 
cally, than has ever been necessary in this country. Still, he 
has nothing to gain by abusing his authority, for he possesses 
every advantage that a man can have; and he has every 
thing to lose in risking these ; above all his gigantic fame 
is an unimpeachable security for his good conduct. Would 
he place this at hazard"? To imagine it would be to suppose 
him mad. 

But if events, which the whole tenor of his life forbids us 
to anticipate, were to happen, their effects could not outlast 
his life, for there is no one to take his place. 

Colombia will then settle into a republican form of 
government, of a strong character, with modifications de- 
manded by the state of her society, by the extent of her 
territory, and by the singular intermixture of her popula- 
tion ; and there is no reason to apprehend the stability of 
her institutions. She does and will exercise a powerful in- 
fluence over the neighbouring states. The whole of Spanish 
America, our country, and even Europe, are deeply in- 



108 

terested in her condition, England for instance has too 
much of the capital of her subjects invested there in shape 
of loans and otherwise, has lost too much blood in the revo- 
lutionary contest, and now, in expectation of a much larger 
trade, drives a commerce far too lucrative, to permit her to 
regard with an indifferent eye the future destiny of Colom- 
bia, or for her to permit, without interposing her force, a 
country which never can be a colony of hers, to have the 
foundations of its society and its government broken up. 

How wonderful are the dispensations of providence ! and 
how often do we see good arise from positive evil, from vio- 
lation of moral obligations! The author of good has benefi- 
cently ordered it so that after the offender has been scourged, 
the tendency of his evil deeds themselves is obviated, their 
ill effects diverted ; sometimes indeed after a long interval ; 
there is a curative power, a vis medicatrix, a restorative force, 
in all the grand operations of nature and of morals. Eng- 
land has been the greatest monopolist of the world, no na- 
tion has promoted its commerce, manufactures, and agricul- 
ture with such interdictions, none has been so tyrannical over 
its colonies*, none has guarded them with such Argus 
jealousy, down to the time when she has engrossed almost 
all colonies, and has created such a prodigious mass of 
manufacturing industry as to enable her to undersell every 
other nation in every market, and to render nothing so desira- 
ble for her as to induce other nations to take off all inter- 
dictions; and therefore she now offers the delusive temptation 
of removing her interdictions, if other nations will do the 
same — she can well afford to do so, when her previous 
measures have placed her in a situation to supply the whole 
world, and to break up all commerce and all manufactures 
by underselling them in their own parts and at their own 
gates. While she pursued the most rigorous policy with re- 
gard to her own colonies, she never ceased to violate the 
rights and the laws of other nations in respect to their colo- 
nies ; she has never ceased to be the great smuggler of the 



Let any one who doubts this remember the East Indies. 



109 

world; she has always endeavoured to destroy the restric- 
tive system of others; she constantly made her way into 
Spanish America, in spite of the opposition of the mother 
country, in defiance of the guarda costas and all the attirail 
of Spanish despotism; she seized at every favourable opportu- 
nity ports, and islands, as Trinidad, the Falkland isles, Eng- 
lish Guiana, and innumerable others, convenient depots for 
her merchandize, and convenient stations whence to run her 
goods into the interdicted countries (I will not here trace 
her course in other regions, but confine my observations to 
America) and in order to open markets for herself: she has 
contributed to the acquisition of the independence of all 
colonies which she could not appropriate to herself, St Do- 
mingo, and Spanish America being the most striking exam- 
ples : she has permitted ships of war, and levies of troops, 
to sail from her ports to aid the Spanish colonies in their 
contest with Spain; professing neutrality, she made, to be 
sure, some demonstrations, put forth some proclamations, 
which came out after the most important expeditions could 
not be seriously aifected by them; but it is a farce to say 
that so watchful a government would be ignorant of the cir- 
cumstances, when men were levied by legions, and when 
frigates were building in her ports ; her merchants supplied 
the greater part of the arms to the colonies, and millions were 
publicly raised on her exchange for loans to them. Thus 
did the most signal selfishness on her side largely contribute 
to the emancipation of a continent, and to the independence 
of a numerous and gallant race*. Let no man say that it 



* De Pradt, in his work Des Colonies, &c. has expressed these ideas better than 
I do :-- 

" Les raetropoles les plus jalouses de I'exclusif chez elles, sont les plus 

infatigables a le violer chez les autres. Ainsi I'Angleterre, tres exclusive dans 
ses colonies propres, et sans cesse occupee a violer I'exclusif chez les autres, en 
faisant penetrer ses marchandises dans leurs colonies. Depuis qu'il y a des colo- 
nies espagnoles, elle n'a pas cesse de sapper leur regime exclusif, elle fit la guerre 
de 1740 a I'appui de ses contrebandiers. Dans les vingt-cinq dernieres annees, 
elle a fait encore plus, car partout elle a affi-anchi et porte a s'afFranchir, pourvu 
que I'exclusif disparut a son egard : fait elle autre chose, depuis dix annees sur la 
riviere de la Plata, et sur toute la cote de I'Amerique meridionale?" — De Pradt 
des Colonies, Vol. I. p. 247. 
P 



110 

was English philanthropy, the sturdy spirit of English free- 
dom, which could not bear the spectacle of slavery — stuff! 
let her emancipate Ireland*, let her set her West Indian 
slaves at large, let her throw open the ports of her islands, 
let her establish liberal institutions in Hindostan, and then 
we might put some faith in this " euphemism." The result, 
however, of her policy, directed solely to acquiring fresh and 
larger markets for trade and for employment of her capital, 
has been to involve her to such a degree in the questions of 
independence and of the stability of the South American 
governments and of none more than that of Colombia that 
she can not now. afford to lose the investments she has 
made — I mean the investments of her subjects ; and she 
therefore must, she is obliged to, co-operate in the main- 
tenance of both ; she will do so by negociation and influence, 
if she can; if not, she will interpose force. It is certainly 
a great and important point gained (whether in conse- 
quence of accident or necessity, or of a profound and ad- 
mirable design the result of the most enlightened policyf ) 
that so powerful a nation should be implicated, interested, 
inextricably bound, for her own sake, to support the order of 
things which is imperiously demanded by the welfare of 
Spanish America, and especially of Colombia, one of the 
most important members of the new constellation of empires. 
It would be to protract too much a memoir, already much 
longer than I intended it to be when I began to write, if I 
were to enter at large into the financial and statistical 
details of the countries which are treated of; most of the 
documents are accessible to the readers, although they are 
not as explicit as could be desired : besides, these details 
are not necessary to my design, which is only to shew the 
general relations, the numerical strength, and the proba- 
bility of the permanency of the governments. I therefore 



* See Chateaubriand's Address, translated in the National Gazette, February 
1827. : 

f Mr Canning says, " I called America into existence." Do the records of de- 
clamation afford a parallel to such arrogance ? If any foreigner could say so it 
would be Mr Clay. But her own spirit and her own good sword gave indepen- 
dent existence to South America. 



Ill 

pass to the next great division of the continent, without 
touching upon the Guianas, of too little consequence in the 
grand scale to delay us, and destined when they acquire 
sufficient population, if that ever happens, or when circum- 
stances demand it, to be absorbed by one or other of their 
more powerful neighbours. 



— ©©©— 



CHAPTER XIII. 



B 



•RAZIL, with an area of 256,990 square marine leagues, 
82,690 more than the territory of the United States, contains 
4,000,000 inhabitants* ; of which, whites 920,000; Indians 
260,000 ; negro slaves 1,728,000 ; free blacks J 59,000, slaves 
of mixed blood 202,000, freemen of mixed blood 426,000t ; 
the aggregate of these numbers, 3,695,000, differs from the 
first total on account of an estimate which the baron makes 
at the distance of four or five years from the dates of the 
enumeration effected between September 1816 and 1818; 
the present numbers must considerably exceed four millions, 
without computing the Banda Oriental, but I take this sum 
as being the best authenticated ; the proportions of the se- 
veral races probably maintain nearly the same ratio to one 
another. Taking Brazil at 257,000 square leagues, and 
the population at four millions, there are fifteen souls to the 
square leaguef, which however are very unequally appor- 
tioned on the surface of the country. 

Whatever has been said before of Mexico and Colombia 
relative to the aristocratic or despotic propensities induced 



* Humboldt, ut ante, Vol. VI. Part I. p. 127, 
t Ibid. Part I. p. 141. and Part II. p. 837. 
% Ibid. Part I. pp. 185. 337. 



112 

by the colonial institutions, the peculiarity of the conquest, 
and above all by the diversity of the castes among the popu- 
lation, applies with equal force to Brazil. But the immense 
number of slaves, and the continuation of slavery in Brazil, 
make those observations apply to this country with a vastly 
increased force. The inmigration of the king of Portugal, 
the court, and a strong body o'^ troops, added to the former 
prejudices and predilections of the inhabitants of Brazil, seal- 
ed the fate, and decided the form, of its government. Every 
thing said to shew the probability of a strong government 
being established in Mexico and Colombia, applies with ten 
fold vigour to Brazil, from the same causes ; the number of the 
slaves superadds to the probability ; they cannot be kept 
down, outnumbering the whites, as they do so largely, un- 
less there be always a strong military force on foot ; which, 
while it protects the whites, and particularly the masters, 
from insurrection of their slaves, will be ready organized for 
action against any attempt to change the existing order of 
things among the rest of the population. There can therefore 
be no revolutionary movement in Brazil like that in the Spa- 
nish colonies, and there has been none. No two things could 
be more dissimilar than the absolute rejection of the Spanish 
dominion, metropolis, monarch, dynasty, allegiance — in short 
the total abruption of every connection with the antecedent 
regime, in the Hispano-American colonies, and the separa- 
ration of Brazil from Portugal. In the one instance every 
bond was burst asunder, in the other there was a mere nom- 
inal division of the relation between the mother country and 
the colony, without in the least affecting the allegiance to the 
king, and without the least disparagement to his title; be- 
cause the whole operation emanated from the monarch and 
was conducted by himself. The consequence is that he 
finds himself at the head of an empire more powerful, now 
it is divided, than both kingdoms were while united, and in- 
finitely more so than the mother country. We see therefore 
that the present monarch has wisely branched his family into 
two dynasties, retaining for himself the best country, and 
allotting to his daughter and to his brother, whose aspirations 
for a crown had previously compromitted the tranquillity of 



113 

both countries, that kingdom which gave birth to the em- 
pire to which he has Umited his desires. The whole ap- 
paratus of monarchy was actually existing in Brazil, and 
when the late king inmigrated he brought with him a vast 
accession of strength and materials for it. These continued 
under the regency, and Don Pedro had nothing to do but to 
assume a title when the bases of the empire were already 
laid, to assume the name when the essence and spirit already 
existed, to place the throne upon the dais already raised to 
support it. I will not recapitulate the observations formerly 
made, but will only say that every cause for a monarchical 
government in Mexico and Colombia, which have since been 
modified there, exists in Brazil, that there are stronger causes, 
and many others have been ad6ed in Brazil, none taken 
away ; no modification, no causes to operate a change, have 
been created; and no revulsion has taken place to alter the 
essential forms of the government, nor to change the spirit 
and inclinations of the people. The expansion of intellect 
which characterizes the age, and the good counsels, as well as 
the enlarged views, by which the emperor appears to be guid- 
ed, have impelled him, and will continue to do so, to establish 
as much liberality in his forms of government, and as many 
liberal institutions in his empire, as can be expected from a 
monarch or from the extraordinary combination of circum- 
stances which characterize the population and the country. 
Brazil will settle down, and in fact has already done so, into 
a constitutional monarchy, with a representative body, and 
a chamber of nobility; the whole forming however a very 
strong government. I see no probability for an age to come 
of any thing like a republic there : some commotions, re- 
bellions, or insurrections may take place, but they will sub- 
side into the original forms; the foundations of the existing 
state of things are too deeply laid to be overthrown. Brazil 
however is entirely and absolutely American (with this ex- 
ception) in all her views, all her interests, all her policy; they 
are cemented, identified, with the rest of the continent; and 
her destruction would be the inevitable consequence of an 
attempt to divorce herself from the American system. I 
consider her government as among the most firmly establish- 



114 

ed on the continent. This militates I know against the 
wishes of many of my fellow citizens, but I can not help it, 
it is my candid opinion ; nor do I see how a philanthropist, 
with a full knowledge of the nature and character of her 
population, can desire that every link of society should be 
disconnected, in the hope, the mere hope, the remote chance, 
of a form of government more congenial to our feelings be- 
ing created out of the chaos which must arise from an at- 
tempt to alter institutions to which the whole nation is 
familiarized and attached. If Brazil should ever undertake 
to propagate her prejudices among the other nations of the 
continent, she would deserve and would receive exemplary 
chastisement; but she will not be so mad, she must know 
the danger she would incur, and must anticipate the fearful 
retaliation to which she is open : on the other hand it would 
be a bad specimen of the adherence of republicans to their 
principles, especially to the one which they maintain so 
strongly that every nation has a perfect right to determine 
upon its own form of government, if they were to infringe 
upon the right in this instance. 

Brazil is a strong constitutional aristocratic representative 
monarchy, but in her other characteristics is American all 
over ; and the permanency of her government can not be 
doubted. 

To suppose that she is not to have disputes with her 
neighbours, is to fancy the return of the golden age ; but 
they will find great difficulty in making effective war upon 
one another because of the distances which are enormous, 
and of the risk as well as the expense of supporting armies 
in countries so thinly settled, notwithstanding the supplies 
which may be drawn from the abundance of the herds, and 
the advantage of beings able to find green provender almost 
universally, unless for a short interval during the year. Eu- 
rope, with its area 304,700 square leagues and 195 millions 
of inhabitants equal to 639 to the league, would be enabled 
to maintain perpetual war if the same circumstances existed 
within her boundaries ; but in Brazil and the neighbouring 
countries the facilities afforded for indulging warlike inclina- 
tions are obviated by the expanses over which armies would 



115 

have to move, and the expense incident to driving after the 
armies hve provisions which they cannot expect to find every 
where, as in Europe, and of transporting the munitions of war ; 
as to war by means of fleets, countries cannot be subdued by 
it although they may be distressed and their colonies subdued. 
Until therefore the lapse of ages shall replenish those regions 
with inhabitants, a thing by the by not to be expected in 
the vast pampas, and until the formation of the splendid 
compact, which is destined to restrain the wonderful pro- 
pensity nations have to cut one another's throats, there may 
be dissensions, and even hostilities, but they will not be of 
such moment as to disturb seriously the general tranquillity, 
in spite of the jealousy that must prevail between govern- 
ments of such different forms. The contest between Brazil 
and Buenos Ayres is of this stamp : they are disputing about 
the possession of a country which certainly does not belong 
to the latter, not only because it does not choose to belong 
to it, but also because Portugal was the first occupant, if 
there be any faith in history, and was disturbed in the oc- 
cupation by subsequent force and intrigue used by Spain or 
by her colonists; this priority of possession has heretofore 
been the test of titles to territories in America. The Banda 
Oriental, about which they are fighting, never has been in 
possession of Buenos Ayres; unless we call the pendency of 
a negociation a possession, which in fact was broken off by 
the Banda Oriental ; and this induced a war between it and 
Buenos Ayres. The possession of the sea port of Monte Video 
by Brazil is very little to the purpose, when Artigas at the 
head of the inhabitants of the country was, and the latter 
are yet, in open hostilities with both Buenos Ayres and Bra- 
zil. The country will itself decide the question, by declar- 
ing to which it thinks fit to adhere ; and, with the assistance 
of the power to which it does adhere, it is well able to make 
its decision valid. They are therefore disputing about a 
country which in point of fact, whatever may be the abstract 
right, belongs to neither of them. And really it is of no 
great consequence to either, as they both have already more 
territory than they can manage, and much more than their 
population can cover : to the Banda Oriental however it is a 



116 

question of consequence, because the city of Buenos Ayres 
seems to persevere in the exploded doctrines of Spanish mo- 
nopoly, and to be determined that hers shall be the only 
commercial port on the river of the Amazons; a most unjust 
and absurd pretension, and one which deserves to be punished 
by the loss of the left bank of the river with its great estuary. 



CHAPTER XIY. 



T 



HE cidevant viceroyalty of Buenos Ayres, or the Pro- 
vincias Del Rio de la Plata, contained an area of 126,770 
square marine leagues, with a population of 2,300,000 souls* ; 
equivalent to 18 souls to the leaguef. Of which Paraguay^ 
and the Missions have 140,000 ; and the Banda Oriental con- 
tained 45,000 on 86,000 square miles ; Entre Rios 25,000 on 
104,500 square miles§ ; according to the report of Theodo- 
ric Bland, Esq. to our government, dated the 2d of November 
1818. The proportion of the different races is||, whites 
320,000 ; Indians 1,200,000 ; negroes about 60,000 ; and the 
mixed races 742,000. Although the amount of population 
taken off by Paraguay is not exactly known, the numbers are 
sufficiently accurate for our purpose. 

But the country called by Spain Provincias del Rio de la 
Plata, recently under the viceroyalty of Buenos Ayres, and 
embraced in the above calculations of Humboldt, has been 



* Humboldt, Vol. VI. Part I. p. 127, relating to 1823 ; though in page 364 he 
calls it 2,371,000 or two and a half millions, 
t Ibid. p. 377. 

X Ibid. p. 171, 7424 square leagues. 
§ Ibid. p. 171, 6848 square leagues. 
11 Ibid. Part II. pp. 835, 836. 



117 

tlivided. Upper Peru has become the republic of Bolivar, 
covering 37,020 square leagues* : Paraguay is independent; 
and the Entre Rios and Banda Oriental have never recog- 
nized the supremacy of Buenos Ayres ; the latter is the sub- 
ject of the war with Brazil. Humboldt gives the area of the 
United Provinces of Buenos Ayres at 91,528 square leaguesf . 
The Gaceta de Colombia of the 11th of December 1825 
enumerates the provinces, viz. Buenos Ayres, Cordova, Men- 
doza, San Juan, San Luis, Rioja, Catamarca, Santiago del 
Estero, Tuman, Salta, Santafe, Entre Rides, Corrientes ; 
giving the population as 569,999 souls; and stating this 
as an extract from an order of the government, under autho- 
rity of the general congress, circulated on the 17th of June 
1825 to all the provinces. This I assume therefore as the 
most correct statement of the population of the United Pro- 
vinces. 

The same mixture of population, which so remarkably 
characterizes the rest of Spanish and Portuguese America, 
prevails here ; and the observations upon the subject, and 
upon its probable effect, need not be repeated. I approach 
with much apprehension the next head which I have made 
in treating of the other countries ; but I have vowed to speak 
the whole truth, as it appears to my feeble conceptions. 

The country known in the latter years of the Spanish 
domination by the general appellation of the viceroyalty 
of Buenos Ayres, comprehending a great number of in- 
tendencias and governments, or provinces, has been the seat 
of more intestine disturbances and of more opposition to 
the government, since the declaration of independence, than 
any of the other cidevant colonies : it has scarcely been 
at rest for any six consecutive months : revolution after 
revolution has changed the rulers and even the outline of 
the government in the city and its vicinity : many of the 
provinces have disputed the supremacy of the metropolis : 
and many of them have formed themselves into independent 
governments : the revolutions, as well as those disputes, hav- 



* Humboldt, Vol. VI. Part I. p. 171. 
t Ibid. p. 151. 

a 



118 

ing been maintained by armed force, and in many instances 
by sanguinary conflicts. These symptoms render the stabi- 
lity of the government of the provinces extremely problema- 
tical. Buenos Ayres was the scene of more than one inva- 
sion by foreign powers, and had more intercourse with them 
than the rest of the colonies ; the vestiges must have been 
left behind of European principles: we see them in a 
rough and undigested form it is true, mingled with the an- 
cient prejudices, and with the consequences of the diversity 
of races which compose the population. The white popula- 
tion seems to be more democratic than that of the other late 
colonies : but how democratic *? the principle does not seem 
to have extended itself in fact, however it may be granted by 
the letter of the laws, to the other castes, which appear to 
have been made use of only to swell the force, to fill the ranks 
of the troops under command, and direction, and, what is of 
much more importance, under the influence of the whites, 
who disputed with one another the supremacy. Slavery has 
been abolished during these turmoils, but the slaves seem 
only to have been transferred from their agriculture to the 
armies. They have not been invested with the real and es- 
sential rights of citizens, nor can they be, in any part of 
America, as long as the distinction and consequent preju- 
dice of colour continues. They have no electoral nor pacific 
influence in the country ; they have been taken from their 
master's ploughs, to fight their master's battles, lured on by 
the donation of red facings to their coats, and by some 
merely captivating or existing temptations ; but they have 
not in fact been made partakers of the advantages or au- 
thority, to acquire which for those masters they were led 
into action ; they have not ceased to be slaves, because they 
are as much slaves in the army as they were in the fields. 

These observations generally apply to the Indian and 
mixed races: if they were not slaves they were of no civil 
importance in society under the Spanish regime ; although 
the Indians were sometimes rendered formidable by insur- 
rections, or by the warfare of those who continued to be 
termed bravos. those who were not completely reduced to 
submission. They, and the mixed colour, appear to con- 



119 

tinue to hold pretty much the same station in political rela- 
tions that they did before the revolution. Their physical 
and numerical forces have been made use of, in the same 
manner that the blacks have been used ; and in like manner 
they do not appear to have any other political, and still less 
moral, influence in the country. 

The report of Mr Bland exhibits a melancholy state of 
public feeling in 1818, and a discordancy among the pro- 
vinces truly lamentable. Since the date of that report, the 
government and the country have gradually improved in 
consolidation, tranquillity, and permanency ; but not suffi- 
ciently to bring my mind to a conviction of the permanency of 
their institutions yet, without the influence of some powerful 
interference ; such as would be exercised by the pacific im- 
pulse which will be given by the grand American confede- 
ration. If this consummation, devoutly to be wished for, does 
not take place, I should not be surprised if the anarchical 
materials (for from what has passed it must be evident that 
they cannot be considered truly democratic) which exist in 
the temperament of the predominant caste, the whites, and 
in the distracting contrarieties of the three other inferior 
colours, should terminate in the adoption of a monarchical 
form of government, savouring more of despotism than the 
institutions of any other state of the American continent. 
So near are the confines of anarchy to those of despotism, 
and so prone are mankind to take refuge under the protec- 
tion of the strongest form of government from the evils of 
that state of aflTairs in which neither persons nor property 
are safe. Should this be the case, there will probably be 
still preserved something like a legislative body, but it will 
be characterized with so many qualifications that it will be 
nothing more than an organ of the executive will : there 
will not be a regularly constituted and efficient aristocracy*, 



* Perhaps the term nobility would be more correct ; for the sultan's favour 
creates a kind of aristocracy among his slaves ; offices do the same every where ; 
and failing these nature herself has made some men stronger or wiser than others-. 
What I mean by a regularly constituted aristocracy is one on the model of that of 
modern Europe, and of Rome and Greece, not to speak of the original inhabitants 
of the other countries. 



120 

for such a class does not belong to despotism j and if there . 
must be a monarchy it is probably the most effectual defence 
of the rights of the whole community against the encroach- 
ments of the sovereign authority. But I believe that 
Buenos Ayres is reserved for a better fate, if the American 
system goes into operation. 

The revolution in Buenos Ayres may fairly be said to have 
had its first sparks struck at the date of Sir Home Popham's 
invasion; so that the flames of independence, which have 
since, like a glorious bale fire, blazed on the mountain tops 
and illuminated every valley in America, were kindled there 
quite as early as in any of the Spanish colonies. The sepa- 
ration of this country from Europe is as decided and irre- 
trievable as that of any of the others, whatever phase the 
government may assume. If a monarchy were established, a 
king might be borrowed from abroad, but he would necessarily 
be American in his politics, as would be any other form of 
government. The question of complete disseverance from 
Europe is decided for ever all over this continent. Buenos 
Ayres therefore will unquestionably be thoroughly identified 
with American interests and with the American system. 



CHAPTER XV. 



Jl ARAGUAY is nearly a terra incognita ; we know al- 
most nothing about it. The singular isolation in which it 
has been the policy of its government, or of its ruler, to keep 
the country, has prevented any certain and detailed infor- 
mation of its state of society, or of its concerns, from reach- 
ing the rest of the world. All that can be said is, that if 
Buenos Ayres should pass into the hands of a vigorous go- 
vernment, Paraguay will probably fall into its possession. 



121 

But Paraguay cannot for a long time be amalgamated witlj 
Buenos Ayres ; whatever may be the form of government 
established, if that country be comprehended, it must form 
a separately governed province or state, with nothing more 
than an allegiance to the common head : the diversity of 
sentiment and the opposition of the institutions of Paraguay 
to those of the rest of the ancient viceroyalty, indicate this in 
a manner not to be misunderstood. The existence of a very 
small independent nation is out of the question at this time of 
day, especially of one surrounded by the dominions of large 
powers. This is indicated by the fate of the minor sovereign- 
ties of Italy and of Germany ; none of which have been for 
several ages in fact entirely independent, except for very 
short periods of time, and when contests among the greater 
powers occupied so much of their attention as to leave no 
leisure to attend to inferior relations. Paraguay cannot 
therefore maintain its independence with its present popula- 
tion ; it will be absorbed by one of its greater neighbours, 
no doubt by Buenos Ayres, before it acquires population 
adequate to make good its independence ; and by the time 
that it contains numbers sufficient to do so, the inhabitants 
will be habituated and reconciled to a different state of af- 
fairs. In addition to the argument drawn from precedents 
and from the antipathy of the world to the existence of small, 
detached, independent, nations, it is very plain that such a 
one would not be endured with institutions so entirely at va- 
riance with the policy and the interest of the conterminous 
countries. As long however as this province continues in 
its present state, it must be entirely American ; every inte- 
rest and every policy tend to connect it with the American 
system : it is of course as definitively alienated from Europe 
as any of the other South American nations. The area of 
Paraguay, as has been before said, is according to Humboldt 
7424 leagues, with 140,000 inhabitants. 



122 



CHAPTER XVI. 



T, 



HE next country of which I shall treat is Chili. To 
this nation also applies much of what has been previously 
said of the others; and repetition will be avoided as much as 
possible. Chili upon an area of 14,240 square leagues had 
a population in 1823 of 1,100,000 souls*, being nearly se- 
venty-seven and a half to each square league, which is 
considerably more than equal to half the average population 
of the United States east of the Mississippi, which compre- 
hends our densest population. 

I am not able to give as exactly as heretofore the estimate 
of the numbers of the different races ; because Humboldt 
has not discriminated between Chili and Peru, but has given 
both together ; nor have I been able to rectify the omission 
from any of the documents I have. Baron Humboldt gives 
for Peru and Chili, Indians 1,030,000, Whites 465,000, the 
mixed races 853,000, and for all the Spanish continental 
America 387,000 slaves. It is true that Mr Bland in his 
report says that the population of Chili is more homogeneous, 
has less of the African blackening, and a smaller proportion 
of slaves than any other portion of Spanish America; that 
there were at the time of his mission 50,000 descendants of 
the Indians who were slaves ; that there had been great mix- 



* Humboldt, as before, Vol. VI. Part I. p. 127. ; it is stated however to be 
1 ,200,000 in Mr Bland's Report made in 1818. 



123 

ture ; that the huasos or peasantry of the country are all of 
this class ; and that not more than one-third of the popula- 
tion of Peru are whites, the other two-thirds being negroes 
and mulattoes, bond and free*. These statements agree 
with communications to the writer from a distinguished gen- 
tleman, a native of Chili ; but they are not precise enough 
to authorize any numerical discrimination here. I think, 
however, that we may fairly conclude that Mr Bland's ac- 
count of the total number of the inhabitants was nearly cor- 
rect, and believe that they are at present, at the distance of 
eight years from the time when he wrote, at least 1,300,000 
or perhaps 1,400,000. Among these there are very few ne- 
groes or offspring of a mixture with them : but, from all the 
information I have been able to collect, I infer that the 
Indians and the mixed race of their blood amount to at 
least two-thirds of the whole population; leaving say from 
45(),000 to 500,000 of the pure white race, although the num- 
ber of this class is rated much higher by some of the South 
Americans. If the last should be greatly more numerous 
than my estimate, should they even compose half the popula- 
tion, the foundation for the induction which has been drawn 
in relation to the other states applies also here, in a greater 
or less degree according to the proportion of the several 
races, which I have no materials for determining precisely. 
This induction is that there cannot exist a democratic equa- 
lity in the country as long as the prejudice shall continue, 
(which has endured until it appears to be a natural sentiment) 
of pre-eminence of the whites over all the other colours. 
Laws go for a great deal ; persistence in an uniform system 
of legislation will gradually affect the moral principle, the 
habits of thinking, of a people; but the grand and funda- 
mental law, the constitution, of a nation at any given time 
is the prejudice, or the opinion, of the population at that 
particular period. The wisest and best laws may be enact- 
ed, but if they are not supported by the sentiments and as- 
sent of a considerable portion of the country, they cannot 
be executed. This assent may be given from different mo- 



Mr Bland's Report, pages 108 and 112 of the copy published for congress. 



124 

tives : part of the inhabitants, and the most active part, is en- 
gaged in supporting the government in various ways, in the 
thousand civil posts from the minister of stale down to the 
catchpole and the taxgatherer, or among the military from 
the commander in chief down to the sutler and batman, and 
to the apprentice to the tailor who makes the uniforms ; all 
these have their families dependent upon them or have influ- 
ence over one or more persons ; and thus in every country 
there must exist a large number of individuals who are bound 
by their interest to support the ruling powers in whatever 
they do : another portion of the inhabitants give their assent 
to laws because they have a reverence for laws in general ; 
thinking that, whatever the law may be, there is an obliga- 
tion upon them to comply with it and to support it, or be- 
cause being interested in the common welfare they would 
prevent any change from taking place in the institutions — 
these support the enactments for the law's sake. Another 
and far the greatest portion adhere to the law, or suffer it to 
be executed, out of sheer apathy; provided they are not dis- 
turbed, they care little how the world goes 5 whatever may 
be the speculations in Utopia and elsewhere, the great body 
of mankind belong to this class; if they did not, we should 
never hear of oppressions, for otherwise when an act disa- 
greeable to them were committed the body would move, 
and a single motion of such a mass would shake down any 
throne however fortified, as the movement, a mere tremor, 
of the earth prostrates palaces of kings and crumbles the 
cloud capt mountains. An assent to laws must then be given 
by the different classes or component parts of a population, 
and by the great bulk of it, either by engaging actively in 
obeying them and causing them to be obeyed, or by quietly 
submitting to them ; the interest of one class leads to the 
former course, the indifference of another to the latter course, 
and universally there is a prejudice among the people in 
favour of law. But where this prejudice does not exist, law 
cannot exist ; and where a law is made contradictory to a 
prejudice which is stronger than the general one on the side 
of the law, or in other words stronger than that prejudice 
upon which obedience to the laws is founded, in such a case 



125 

the repugnant ordinance would just go out ; it would be as 
if it were not enacted, unless indeed some madcap were wild 
enough to make it the excuse for disturbances, or, what is 
more usual, some interested or ambitious man were to en- 
deavour to make it the subject of popular excitement and 
the stepping stone for his interest or his ambition. Such 
would be a law in this country, in the south at least, that 
negroes might be members of congress ; it would be as if 
it never had been made, the prejudices of the people would 
deprive it of efficacy, and it would be as much unexecuted 
as if it never had passed. 

I give this strong example only to make my idea thorough- 
ly understood, and not with any intention of an offensive 
application to races which in my opinion (be it right or be it 
wrong) are far superior to that just named. 

The result in my mind of this train of reasoning is a con- 
viction that the laws which declare the different races to be 
perfectly equal in Hispano-America, however just and cor- 
rect they may be, will remain for many generations nearly as 
inoperative as if they never had been passed. I say nearly , 
because there may arise some highly gifted individuals who 
will be exceptions to the general rule. But the system, or 
theory, of equality will be nearly nugatory, because it is in 
direct opposition to the pretension, and the prejudices of 
the inhabitants, prejudices which subsist as strongly among 
the coloured population as among the whites ; they entertain 
an hereditary reverential prejudice of the superiority of the 
whites : it is the same sentiment as that which enabled an 
handful of whites to conquer millions of their forefathers, and 
to overrun the vast territories now under consideration : if it 
had not been for this prejudice the vast hosts which opposed 
Valdivia and his two hundred Spaniards, nay the Mapochians 
alone, would have covered the invaders with a tumulus of 
stones, which they could have done if each of them had thrown 
one, in spite of a few horses and of some bad matchlock mus- 
kets. As long as this prejudice, or rather these preposses- 
sions, exist on both sides, or on either side, the whites must 
remain in the ascendancy over the other race, whatever may 
be the disproportion of the numbers. 
R 



126 

Among the whites themselves great inequality must exist 
for a long time, and until a total change shall take place in 
their habits, their education, and their character. The 
country was originally laid off in large donations to the con- 
querors ; and, as in all such cases, the officers had the 
lion's share. I have before dwelt so much upon the inevit- 
able feodality, in principle and in practice, whatever may be 
the letter of the law, which is incident to all conquests fol- 
lowed by location on the conquered soil, that I need not re- 
new the argument here. Chili does not form an exception 
to the precedents quoted above, nor to the inductions drawn 
from them, nor from the general position of the cidevant 
colonies. Education is confined almost exclusively to the 
gentry, to the descendants of the conquering chiefs, and of 
those of their caste who followed their immigration ; and edu- 
cation is almost invariably influence. But this source of in- 
fluence is strengthened in Chili by the long continued habits 
of subserviency among the other classes of society and by the 
disposition of the wealth of the country, which is concentrated 
in the hands of the upper class ; a wealth which they have 
abundant bravery to defend, even if the enlightened spirit of 
the age permitted the sacred rights of property to be invaded. 
To which we may add that the revolution has been princi- 
pally the work of the gentry. Whatever therefore may be 
the written or theoretical equality among the inhabitants of 
Chili, the power and government of the country will practi- 
cally and actually remain in the hands of the present posses- 
sors, for a period only to be limited by the slow progress of 
education, of other habits, and of commerce. Some deser- 
ters from the corps, or some gifted individuals of the other 
castes wilt no doubt rouse the whole mass to exercise the 
franchises given by laws, in order to advance them individually 
to power and ascendancy; but the moment that this object 
is gained, they will be reunited to their corps or will unite 
with the interests of the ruling caste ; just as we have seen in 
Europe nobles quit their station beside their peers to head 
popular factions, and, after violent disturbances, acquire 
higher titles or greater fortunes, perhaps thrones, and then 
join again the ranks of their original companions, to gain a 



127 

superiority over whom they quitted their places-— just as we 
have seen men not nobles, but of superior talents, rouse the 
people and force their admission into the class which their 
birth did not give them a right to enter. Such is man : and 
such is the destiny of every country which has been con- 
quered : if the wants of the labouring classes in England 
were to occasion a complete destruction of the present order 
of things there, it would only originate a fresh race of no- 
bility, and a new dynasty of kings. The condition of our 
country is therefore (without descending to cant, or to af- 
fectation of sentiment) an agreeable spectacle for every 
lover of republican institutions ; a great part of it having been 
settled by men from the middle class of society in the mother 
country, pretty nearly equal to one another in knowledge, 
and every thing else, unless where their spiritual leaders 
formed few and not strongly discriminated exceptions ; 
and other parts having been occupied by the vestiges of 
two broken parties, also nearly equal among themselves ; 
the ancient inhabitants not being numerous enough to be 
converted into vassals, and having spaces behind them to 
which they might fly to avoid the common destiny of con- 
quered nations ; the experiment of a pure republican form of 
government may therefore be fairly tried here ; and as yet 
every appearance indicates a long duration of our institu- 
tions, if we only hold together; for we are thus too strong 
to be conquered by any foreign force — a force which, if con- 
queror, would make us the vassals and be itself the noblesse. 
Our only danger then is from disunion ; because if separated, 
farewell to republican forms of government ; mutual hostilities, 
jealousy, and individual ambition, will then soon overwhelm 
the robe by the sword, and such a state of things, will demand 
the institution of a fighting corps, a Rajah poot caste, to de- 
fend the independence and the property of the several miser- 
able sections, which will run the career of the nations which 
have preceded us, and which after long contests, after the 
distinction of ranks shall have been oroughly established, 
will be absorbed by one overweening power. Far from 
us, and from our posterity, be such a catastrophe. 

The government of Chili appears, like that of the other 



128 

late Spanish colonies, to have acquired a consistency. 
There may be some changes of the individuals at the head of 
it, or in its forms, but it is consolidated in fact ; and, above 
all, it can never revert to its old masters, nor can it ever be- 
come a colony to any power, especially to a foreign power. 
It would not astonish me, if at some future period Chili, Alto, 
Peru, and Peru Proper were to unite themselves into one 
nation. If it had not been for the relations of Chili with 
B'lenos Ayres, and of Upper Peru with Colombia, as well as 
those of Peru Proper with the same country, I should think 
this union likely to take place, before a very remote time: 
if Peru had not concluded its revolutionary struggle aided 
by Colombia, such an event would have been almost certain ; 
and they would have formed a very fine, rich, and strong na- 
tion. As things have turned up, they will most likely re- 
main for a considerable time in their actual condition ; nei- 
ther is strong enough to conquer the other, and if they ever 
unite it will be by amicable treaty. However this is specu- 
lating far ahead. 



CHAPTER XVII, 



U, 



PPER Peru, now the republic of Bolivar, is another of 
those countries whose statistics are difficult to be ascertained. 
Humboldt* quoting Schmidtmeyer, calls the population of 
the Provincias de La Sierra 1,300,000; he gives the area of 
Upper Peru as 37,020 square leaguesf . Brackenridge J calls 



* Vol. VI. Part I. p. 366. 

t Ibid. p. 171. 

i Ibid. Vol. II. p. 144. 



129 

the population of Upper Peru 1,500,000; he enumerates the 
provinces of Charcas, Potosi, La Paz, and Cochabamba at 
1,496,000, Santa Cruz de La Sierra, Moxos and Chiquitt)s at 
220,000, making a total of 1,7(6,000 of which 500,000 
whites and 986,000 Indians*. But the Gaceta de Colombia, 
the official journal at Bogota, gives, in the number of the 
27th of November 1825, the decree of the general assembly 
of Upper Peru dated the 11th of August 1825, constituting 
the future denomination to be the Republic of Bolivarf ; and 
in the succeeding paragraph, not marked however as offi- 
cial, there is an estimate of the population of " the six pro- 
vinces of Upper Peru which have erected themselves into a 
new republic denominated Bolivar in honour of the libera- 
tor, &c. ; viz. La Paz, Potosi, Cochabamba, Oruro, Chuqui- 
zaca, and Santa Cruz. They contain a population approxi- 
mating a million of souls," &c. It is worthy of remark that 
the act and declaration of independence dated the 6th of 
August 1825, published in the same Gazette of the 11th of 
December 1825, is signed by the deputies of Charcas, Po- 
tosi, La Paz, Cochabamba, and Santa Cruz. I take the 
semi-official estimate and the official document, to be sub- 
stantially correct; with only one observation, that it is said 
bj the South Americans, and no doubt with great justice, that 
the enumerations of the inhabitants by order of the govern- 
ments are likely to be underrated, as the people concealed 
as much as possible their actual numbers, out of fear of the 
levies of men or money, to apportion which these enumera- 
tions were generally made : those calculations therefore which 
were deduced from the old Spanish colonial documents, are 
probably near the truth. The great uncertainty, existing to 
the latest dates, respecting the geography and political situ- 
ation of the provinces lying in the interior of the continent, 
has occasioned the variation among different authors in their 
designation of the provinces which they denominate Upper 



* Humboldt, pp. 148, 149. 

t It is curious that this should have been published as Bolivia in most of oui 
newspapers, and in the Colombian state papers and journals. 



130 

Peru, but the official declaration above quoted admits of no 
contradiction. 

The republic of Bolivar has adopted the constitution pro- 
posed to it by the liberator, and has chosen him president for 
life, with leave to name his successor. This is a strong form 
of government, with checks upon the executive and legislative 
powers, the efficacy of which remain to be proved. Some of 
its provisions, particularly that of the presidency for life, were 
discussed by the convention which established our constitu- 
tion ; but some of the details, the mechanism, of the govern- 
ment, so to express it, are as new as they are complicated ; if 
the engine thus complicated will work, it is probable that the 
nation will remain republican ; I have no doubt that it will as 
long as Bolivar is at its head ; but it is very questionable 
whether the inhabitants will not get tired of so many forms as 
are prescribed and desire to simplify the system* : if a man 
should succeed Bolivar who wishes to strengthen the hands 
of the chief magistrate, he will have little difficulty, it seems 
to me, in creating a disgust for the complexity of the present 
constitution ; then it remains to be seen whether this plan, 
added to their ancient predilections, will not have so prepared 
the people's mind for monarchy, as to lead to such a govern- 
ment. Still I do not conceive that a monarchy can be any 
where established in the new nations without its assuming a 
constitutional shape, probably on the model of the govern- 
ments of France or England, with an extensive representa- 
tion of the white population at least. The question there- 
fore of the durability of republicanism in the republic of 
Bolivar, I believe, will depend greatly upon the general adop- 
tion of the American system which it is the object of this 
memoir to advocate. For the present, the government of 
this nation appears to be sufficiently characterized with the 
modifications of permanency, and sufficiently established, 
for all the purposes of civil society, in its exterior as well as 
its interior relations ; and there cannot be a hesitation in de- 



* The writer little imagined when he penned this sheet that his calculations 
would so soon be verified : he does not efface because it yet remains to be seen 
rwhether the BoliviaB constitution will not ultimately prevail. . ' 



131 

ciding that it is for ever enfranchised from foreign dominion. 
Although I am not able to cite authorities, as heretofore, 
for the numerical ratio of the different races which inhabit 
this country, yet the proportion assigned by judge Bracken- 
ridge for the provinces he enumerated as above quoted is 
probably not far from being correct with respect to the re- 
public of Bolivar, that is, the whites constitute about one- 
third of the population, the remainder being of the mixed 
race and Indians ; there are very few negroes or mulattoes. 
Whatever has been said, in treating of the other cidevant co- 
lonies, respecting the ascendancy of the whites, applies to this 
country ; but I must confess that the devotion exhibited for the 
liberator, which is almost the same sentiment as that which 
is in royal dominions called loyalty, and the strength of the 
constitution which has been adopted, seem to manifest even 
a greater aptitude for a constitutional kingdom than is 
exhibited by any of the other states. If Bolivar had sons 
I should be inclined to anticipate their succession, un- 
der colour of an appointment by the incumbent, at the 
entreaty of the legislative bodies, which might easily be got 
up by a skilful and popular chief; but as he has not child- 
ren, and as he is now of an age when he can hardly expect 
to have them of sufficient maturity to be placed at the head 
of the government until he is far advanced in life, I must 
infer from the precedents in history that, in case the present 
form of government lasts, at least one succession will take 
place strictly in conformity with the provisions of the con- 
stitution he has established. The character of Bolivar how- 
ever, and the proofs he has given of his preference of fame 
to power, are guarantees of his sincerity, even if he had heirs 
in the direct line to succeed him, and much more standing as 
he does without the strong inducement of parental affection 
to prompt a deviation from the splendid career he has chalk- 
ed out for himself. If then the American system be adopted, 
the republic of Bolivar will probably continue for a long time 
in its present situation ; if not, no man can answer for its desti- 
nies, nor for the effect of the complexity of its constitution ; 
and then it is very certain that the character of the Bolivians 
must possess much more stability than that of any other peo- 



132 

pie which has preceded them on the great stage of history, 
if they do not follow what appears to have been the course of 
every nation, except our own, and after various alterations 
or contests subside into the calm of an hereditary monarchy 
— although I still maintain that there is little probability of 
this any more than of the other states adopting any modifi- 
cation of monarchy without a constitution and a representa- 
tive system. The limitrophe empire of Brazil gives an ex- 
ample of this kind of monarchy; but the fact is that Chili is 
as near to China for all purposes of communication as Chu- 
quizaca to Rio de Janeiro, indeed the access by sea is ea- 
sier than the passage of the immense unknown regions which 
separate the empire from the republics, or rather separate 
the populations, the substance, and the body of the respec- 
tive nations, wheresoever their boundary lines may be imagi- 
ned to run; the communication between them is likely to 
be for a long time down the river La Plata, or by sea, to 
Buenos Ayres : so that the forms adopted in Brazil will not 
much affect the republic, whatever may be the operation of 
the examples of Chili, Peru Proper, and especially of Colom- 
bia with which it is now so intimately connected. 

But there is a cause which will much more immediately 
press upon the general sentiment, and the forms of govern- 
ment in the republic of Bolivar as well as in all the new 
states ; it will be found in the propensities and prejudices of 
the Indian portion of the population, and their descendants 
however mixed with other blood, I have already endea- 
voured to explain my idea that democratic institutions can 
hardly be said to exist in countries where so large a propor- 
tion of the population is composed of a race which is looked 
upon as subordinate to the whites in consequence of deeply 
rooted prejudices. If the present patriotic, I had almost said 
cosmopolite, declarations of the leaders of public opinion, 
and of the governments, could be carried into effect, the 
Indians would be elevated to an equality of condition in so- 
ciety and to an equal participation in the government, by 
the diffusion of education and of all the privileges of the 
citizens; in this case the Indians would bring into, and add 
to, the common stock, their prejudices, their habits of think- 



133 

ing, and their propensities for particular forms of govern- 
ment. And what are they'? We know that their governments, 
at the time of the conquests of their several countries by 
the Spaniards, bore a remarkable affinity, a strong family 
likeness, to the constitutional empires or kingdoms of Eu- 
rope — first were the emperor, the inca, the toqui; charac- 
terized by all the attributes of the European monarchs, almost 
enshrined within their palaces, or surrounded by a court and 
guards paying them almost divine honours when they left 
their usual places of abode, qualified in terms equivalent to 
the sacred majesty, semper augustus, dread sovereign, most 
potent king, your grace, by the grace of God, and twenty 
other hyperboles which attach to crowns and supreme power 
in those monarchies which assume to be peculiarly civilized ; 
to which were added descents and titles equally pretended 
to in Europe and in Asia, from the heroes of the darkest ages 
of antiquity, the Lydian kings, the Roman emperors, the 
conquering prophets, children of the sun, and brothers of 
the moon. Then came the caciques, the apoulmenes, al- 
most sovereigns in their own territories, where they were 
approached with homage nearly similar to those of the mon- 
archs, with state and pomp equal to those of the English 
or French dukes or the German electors, and yet who were 
proud of occupying titles and places in the households of 
their sovereigns; then caciques of the second order, or 
simple ulmenes, powerful in their districts, filling, like the 
noblesse of Europe, the subordinate offices of the army and 
of the civil department : nor must the hierarchies be forgot- 
ten so resembling those of Europe. After the conquest, 
to the hereditary attachment and prejudices of these Indians 
in favour of the descendants of their ancient and indigenous 
princes was added a new subordination to the colonial no- 
bility, and generally to the white race. If the Indians 
therefore should be elevated to the grade of constituent 
members of the new form and organization of society, they 
will bring into it their old prejudices, the more concentrated 
and the more inveterate from having been so long compres- 
sed, in favour of forms of government which their education, 
and their habits of thought, have rivetted upon their mijids. 
S 



134 

If, on the other hand, they are not admitted to an equality 
with the whites, how can governments be called democratic 
in which the majority of the population is held to be inferior 
to a class privileged by its colour, or by any other cause"? 
It is a curious predicament, in which without introducing 
such an equality there can not be a democracy, and yet 
when introduced it will bring with it prejudices and causes 
which have a tendency to monarchy and aristocracy. 

The jealousy which always has existed, and always will 
subsist, between people of different races and different co- 
lours, will come in as a further inducement to the adoption 
of forms, to which one caste may be reconciled by their being 
connected with traditions of long lost national indepen- 
dence, power, and splendour, and which are fresh in the 
experience or recollection of another caste in association 
with reminiscences of recent superiority and the pride of 
conquests. This jealousy has not heretofore been able to 
shew itself, indeed it did not exist; for the feelings which 
predominated among the Indians in their subdued condition 
must have been ineffectual hatred to the ascendant caste or 
the humility of a subjugated race ; the other race could not 
entertain an idea of rivalship. But when those who were 
formerly depressed and disregarded are raised to a legal 
equality and are placed in a condition in which they may 
compete with their former masters, then jealousy will ensue, 
and probably violent contests ; the wealth, organization, dis- 
cipline, and above all the habitual superiority, on one side ; 
and the numerical force disproportionately on the other 
side. I have no doubt that all contests will terminate as 
heretofore to the advantage of the whites : but both sides, 
fatigued with the dangers, insecurity, and apprehensions 
which must attend such a state of things, will naturally seek 
for a mediatory power, which may protect on one hand and 
maintain the party most likely to be overwhelmed in its newly 
acquired rights, and on the other may guard the less nume- 
rous party from the encroachments, and even the spoliations 
or invasion of the rights of property and security of person 
which it will apprehend from those whom it had long kept 
in a state of subserviency. Both parties will look for a 



136 

power which is able to keep peace between them. This 
power will be found in a sovereign with a strong army to 
enforce his decrees. The power of the European monarchs 
mainly originated from this principle, more or less developed: 
the ambition, influence, and power of individuals certainly 
were the immediate causes ; those individuals being however 
generally and originally kings or chiefs of the conquering 
nations, but who were, as we have before intimated, and 
cited history for the proof, little more than presidents for 
life, a life continually in hazard. They could not neverthe- 
less have permanently extended the limits of their authority, 
if they had not been able to array against the nobles and the 
conquerors, the numerical force of the mass of the people, 
the conquered race, endued with consistency by concen- 
tration round the monarch, and with stability, by rallying it 
to this standard, together with those nobles or those of the 
conquerors who were attached to him from affection, interest, 
or hostility against others of their own caste, coping the 
whole with the king's name, "a tower of strength." Or if 
they had not found means to marshal against the body of the 
people, the gallant chivalry whose discipline and esprit 
de corps more than sufficed to counterbalance a formidable 
disparity of numerical force : thus alternately subduing the 
one party by the other, the noblesse and their adherents by 
the people, and these by the others. This intermediatory 
power, therefore, will probably be called upon to protect 
either party against the encroachments of the other, in all 
countries where such parties exist. But neither the spirit of 
the age, the dissemination of liberal ideas, their precedent 
prejudices and habits, nor the characters of the individuals 
who lead, nor of the nations in question, will admit of a mo- 
narchical form of government without a regular constitution 
and an organized distribution of the four grand powers of 
civilized, nay of every, society — the executive, the judiciary, 
the aristocratic, and the popular. 

These positions apply to the hypothetical condition which 
I do not believe will occur, that the prejudice of superiority 
on the side of the whites, and inferiority on that of the other 
■colours, will be effaced by public sentiment, as well as by 



136 

the laws. It can scarcely be expected that for ages to come 
events will destroy the indurated impressions of more than 
three hundred years, not to go further back and search for 
their origin in nature, or in the almost obliterated traditions 
of the children of the sun. 

If then the races preserve their relative situation with 
respect to one another, as it is my opinion they will, the pre- 
sent forms of government will endure for a Considerable 
time, under modifications no doubt, but still founded upon 
the same principles — principles producing the effects, as I 
believe, which have been heretofore so largely discussed; 
but whose durability and whose resemblance to democrati- 
cal institutions will mainly depend upon the formation of a 
confederacy which will interdict wars within or between 
the American states, thus depriving ambition, one germ* of 
the despotic principle, at once of its plausible excuse for 
grasping supreme domination, and of its means and imple- 
ment for making the acquisition. 



* And only one germ. Tnis ambition must be supported by the imperative 
principle, the faculty cf commanding, else it falls ; and it must be also supported 
by the other germ of despotism — the subfnissive principle, the impulse of obedi- 
ence — that which qualifies men to be reigned over — that flocking disposition 
which induces men to follow where some individuals lead — that which makes some 
soldiers fly when their chief is down — the sentiment which makes people take 
the horses from other men's carriages and perform the part of horses or donkeys 
themselves — they call it loyalty abroad. The two germs are necessary to engen- 
der despotism, for, unless some would drag the triumphal car, none could ride in it, 
and vice versa : and what is remarkable, one of these creates the other, for where 
some cringe, others will domineer. 



137 



CHAPTER XVIII. 



T 



HE last of the cidevant Spanish colonies, in the order 
which has been adopted, now constitutes the republic of Peru 
proper ; and the cursory review of its situation will conclude 
my observations upon the particular condition of Hispano- 
America. 

In the work which has furnished me with the greater part 
of the materials for the statistics of these countries, there 
appear some discrepancies for which I cannot account, but 
the general inferences will not be muchi affected by them. 

The area of Peru is given in Vol, VI. Part I. page 339, 
of Humboldt's Personal Narrative, at 41,400 square leagues j 
in page 167 at 41,500; in pages 127 and 169 at 41,420; and 
in page 171 at 37,020. In page 339 the population is set 
down at 1,400,000 souls, being thirty-four to the square 
league on an area of 41,400 leagues. In page 138 it is 
stated that thirty years ago (from 1824) Peru contained 
1,000,000, of which 600,000 were [ndians, 240,000 mesti- 
zoes, 40,000 slaves, and thence 120,000 whites. These pro- 
portions probably are still nearly correct, and it is also pro- 
bable that the given number of inhabitants in 1823 as well 
as the average number of inhabitants to the square league 
vary from strict accuracy only by some fractions. There 
can not be a doubt but that the rumours of a sensible de- 
crease of population in all these countries, in consequence 
of the relentless manner in which their revolutionary wars 
were conducted, have a serious foundation. But at the same 
time it is to be remarked that the prolific nature of the cli- 



■ i3S 

mate and of the constitutions of the people have done mucii 
to repair the losses, and therefore, allowing for the time that 
has elapsed since the war terminated in the several countries, 
it is most likely that the number of the inhabitants is at this 
moment (1827) pretty nearly what it was computed by Hum- 
boldt in 1823. At any rate, the general results, and the 
train of reasoning upon political economy, are not affected 
by slight variations from strict accuracy. These matters, 
and the data upon which they are founded, can never, from 
the nature of things, be more than approximative. 

Peru was the se&t of the second best viceroyalty in the 
gift of Spain; habits of luxury and ostentation were car- 
ried to an Asiatic excess; there was a vast deal of the ac- 
tual reality of aristocracy in presence of an absolute chief, 
as well as much of the outward exhibition of it; and the 
power of the viceroy was in effect absolute, whatever 
might have been the nominal counterpoise of the audi- 
encia. The enumeration of the inhabitants at the date given 
above, at once accounts for, and justifies (as far as military 
predominance can be justified) by the impulse of self preser- 
vation, the despotic nature of the government of Lima : 
there were 140,000 whites interspersed among a subjugated 
population of 880,000 souls of the other castes, among whom 
were 40,000 negro slaves owned by a comparatively small 
number of the aristocracy; this alone would have been suf- 
ficient to cause the permanent establishment of a species of 
martial law; for without the essence of that law, a rigid 
subordination among the dominant class and a severe sur- 
veillance over the subdued castes, the former must have 
been overpowered by the latter : the luxury derived its ori- 
gin from the same cause; for nothing is more generally 
known than that the military are naturally luxurious, seek- 
ing to indemnify themselves in anticipation or after a cam- 
paign for the fatigues and deprivations of active service ; this 
is fostered and increased by the homage which has ever 
been paid, and ever will be, to the brilliant profession of the 
sword. But another cause corroborated the former institu- 
tions of Peru; it was the quasi place of arms for Chili during 
the long and bloody wars with the Araucanian Indians which 



139 

more than once threatened the existence of the Spanish do- 
minion in that country ; and therefore Peru was influenced 
not only by the spirit of its own military, but to it was added a 
frequent reinforcement by the arrival of the recruits for Chili 
which passed by Lima after the fatigues of a sea voyage 
and long marches by land, during the time occupied by 
both of which the pay of the forces must have accumulated 
for mere want of opportunity to expend it, and, in the true 
spirit of improvident and generous soldiers, they must have 
seized the earliest opportunity to spend their money in a 
delicious climate full of new and untried luxuries; while con- 
sciousness of their strength and well founded hopes of con- 
quest inspired them with a dashing and imperious temper. 
Far be it from me to aim sarcastic or depreciatory observa- 
tions against the profession of arms, the profession which has 
generated the grandest, the sublimest, emotions and re- 
sources of the human soul, or to decry that art for which 
many causes fill me with respect; but, in spite of all my 
predilections for it, I can not disguise from myself the ten- 
dencies of the military spirit. 

The circumstances of colonial Peru were such as inevita- 
bly to give to* the country and to its government, as well as 
to its inhabitants, a complexion more despotic and aristocra- 
tic than that of any of the other colonies : and we see that 
the contest between the colony and the mother country was 
consequently terminated at a later period than in the other 
colonies. 

The invasion of Peru by San Martin would have given, if 
it had been successful and if he had possessed the requisite 
talents, a new impulse to the old spirit of the country; it 
would not have been so much a liberation as a new conquest, 
renewing the principles of conquest in the persons of the Chi- 
lian soi disant auxiliaries, and of those Peruvian chiefs who 
made common cause with them. The result of all the cir- 
cumstances under which Peru stood as a colony, and in her 
revolutionary contest, is that she has the germs of anti-re- 
publican institutions enracinated in her territory more deeply 
than they are in any of the other new states, as I believe. 
Bolivar completed the liberation of Peru, and it remains to 



140 

be shewn what will be the effect of the influence of his ex- 
ample and his principles, which 1 think have been demon- 
strated by his whole conduct to be as republican as the 
condition of South America will permit : he has a most dif- 
ficult part to act, but it seems as if providence has endowed 
him with all the qualifications necessary to enable him to 
perform it with equal renown to himself and advantage to 
the immense regions which regard him as their tutelary 
angel. 

Assuming the above details to be sufficiently correct, the 
observations, heretofore made relative to the other states 
apply also to Peru, and therefore will not be recapitulated. 
The disproportion between the whites, and Indians with the 
mixed blood, is enormous; the prejudices of superiority on 
the one side and of inferiority on the other are the same here 
as in the other countries, and will produce the same results 
which have been ascribed to them elsewhere : a species of 
equality will subsist among the whites, but laws cannot es- 
tablish it between this caste and the others until a length of 
years shall have obliterated those deep rooted prejudices. 
If the country remains at peace, its present form of govern- 
ment will continue, and meanwhile it is sufficiently estab- 
lished and consolidated to be adequate to all purposes of- 
domestic or of exterior relations. But to preserve republican 
institutions the interposition of the great American system 
is necessary. 

Peru will necessarily be a commercial nation to a great 
extent ; her mines alone will secure her this advantage ; and 
the excellence of her climate, the wants and the desires of 
her population, with the goodness of the soil in many parts of 
her territory, would make her commercial, even if she pos- 
sessed no mines ; a nation with such inclinations and with 
such resources to supply her with means to purchase gratifi- 
cations cannot fail to become a large exporter as well as im- 
porter. From this circumstance, and from the extent of the 
Peruvian sea coast, from the intercourse which has, subsisted 
by sea with Chili particularly, from the evident propensity of 
the people who reside upon the shores of the Pacific, from 
the facility with which ship timber may be procured, from the 



141 

enjoyment of health upon the coast so much superior to that 
on the Atlantic side, from the temptation of the markets 
of the East Indias, together with those of the numerous 
islands of the intermediate seas, and finally from the immense 
advantage which they may derive in pursuing the whale fish- 
ery, so abundant in the ocean that washes their strand, or in 
taking other marine animals, from all these causes extensive 
maritime speculations must arise ; thence will follow the ne- 
cessity of an armed marine to guard their interests, and a 
supply of sailors will thence be created as well as the know- 
ledge and aptitude necessary for a navy. The same argu- 
ments apply to Chili and to the Pacific bord of Guatimala 
and Colombia. I have brought both together into one point 
of view to avoid repetition. The distance of these countries 
from Europe, and their demand for the commodities of the 
old manufacturing nations, would seem to require that they 
should not rely upon foreign navigation but should profit of 
the facilities which nature has afforded them, and especially 
of their comparative immunity from disease which I have 
formerly stated as one of the greatest impediments to the 
inhabitants of the countries bordering upon the eastern sea 
coast addicting themselves to maritime enterprise to any great 
extent. The mutual demand of those countries for their re- 
ciprocal productions will be a further stimulus for their be- 
tElking themselves to the ocean, in preference to a tedious, 
expensive, and dangerous land transportation, across the vast 
deserts, which separate them, sometimes by burning sands, 
and more generally by arduous mountains : indeed the bulk 
ofsomeof the articles which they interchange, the wheat of 
Chili for example, seems to forbid land carriage. 

I infer, upon the whole, that the great scene of South 
American and Mexican navies and commercial navigation 
will be the Pacific, and do not doubt but that it will be esta- 
blished upon a large scale. The first development of their 
destiny has been made by the liberal employment of naval 
forces by Chili and Peru during their late contest with 
Spain ; the fate of both appears to have been materially in- 
fluenced by their fleets ; in which large numbers of the na- 
tives have been employed mixed with Europeans or North 
T 



142 

Americans, from whose experience and discipline they must 
have learned the most useful lessons. The archipelago of 
Chiloe, and the necessity of frequent intercourse between 
the islands composing it and the main land, would alone be 
a guarantee for the prevalence of a maritime disposition in 
the dominions of Chili : these islands are at once a provoca- 
tion to naval expeditions and a fruitful nursery for seamen. 



—Q!®©— 



CHAPTER XIX. 



T 



HUS has a summary, much more extensive than I had 
expected it to be, laborious to myself, and I fear tedious to 
many of my readers — thus have data, and arguments ground- 
ed upon them, too long for a mere pamphlet, and yet I fear 
not long enough nor strong enough to produce the conviction 
which it has been my desire to establish — thus have historical 
positions, what I believe to be statistical facts, and reasoning 
drawn from them — thus have all the preceding pages, — pre- 
pared for the discussion, which they were designed to sup- 
port, of the most important topic that has ever been offered 
to the world. What previous conception has equalled 
in moment the project of uniting the whole American conti- 
nent in one grand, splendid, and powerful confederation'? 
It was not equalled in importance by the design of the 
same kind of the generous Henry the fourth and his Sully, 
and the black hearted Elizabeth, for regulating the disputes 
of Europe by an areopagus of monarchs — not by the exist- 
ing Holy Alliance : the materials on which European indus- 
try is chiefly employed, the articles which contribute to 
European luxury, those which are become articles of almost 
primary necessity, and the far greater part of the monetary 
representatives of value, are derived principally from Ame- 



14S 

yica : the country whence are furnished the means of ac- 
quiring wealth must be, in this light at least, of greater 
importance than those countries where they are employed 
or where they acquire new forms; that country, and those 
politics must be considered of prior importance which can 
stop half the industry and close the mints of another conti- 
nent by a simple commercial interdict. The project is not 
equalled by the Roman designs of universal empire ; for these 
had in view the reduction of the human race to a tributary 
state under the oppressive despotism of the oligarchy of a 
single city ; while our object is to guaranty the freedom, 
liberty, happiness, and prosperity of an immense continent. 
It is not equalled by the renown of the ancient confederacy 
of a handful of petty oligarchies and narrow kingdoms in 
old Greece, because the space of territory and the number of 
souls embraced by that inefficient alliance, compared with 
the two Americas and their inhabitants, would bear the pro- 
portion of a mote to a mountain. 

The summary contained in the preceding pages has at- 
tempted to demonstrate that continental Europe is identical 
in interest with America, whatever it may be in passion ; 
that the interest of all the powers of Europe, except Eng- 
land, but not excepting Spain, is, that all America should be 
at peace internally and externally, should push every branch 
of industry to the utmost, and thus advance her agriculture, 
recollecting that the term is not confined to the culture of 
the cerealia, but includes plantations of the aloe and the 
quasi harvest of cochineal, together with cultivation of the 
thousand crops peculiar to her climates, and with the propa- 
gation of stock for meat, for wool, or for their hides — thus in 
a word to supply innumerable materials, either raw or manu- 
factured, to exchange with the old continent for its produc- 
tions, and to supply the necessities or luxury and the manu- 
facturing or commercial enterprise of its inhabitants. It is 
the interest of continental Europe that America should be 
largely commercial, and should in consequence be strong at 
sea, in order to counterbalance the maritime power and the 
all absorbing commerce of England. This interest also de- 
mands that America should be united and strong at home, in 



144 

otder to perpetuate this counterpoise and to prevent the 
disunion, which, by distracting with wars the attention of 
the nations of America from the means by which alone these 
objects can be ensured, would enable the sea girt isle to mo- 
nopolize the commerce of the western world, and to acquire 
by subsidies or by intrigue such an ascendancy over the 
recent nations as would tend to make her the carrier, the 
depository, and the entrepot of their commercial riches, to 
the disadvantage of the rest of Europe, and such as would 
especially prevent the formation in America of a naval power 
which alone might restrain, or united with that of the other 
governments might give the law to, the domineering cross of 
St George. With these views it is the interest of continen- 
tal Europe that the several governments and the civil policy 
of the American states should be consolidated, and, each 
within itself, acquire a consistency and permanency, in order 
to enable them and the inhabitants to pursue the course pre- 
scribed equally by their own and by European advantage. 
The passions and the prejudices of the old governments might 
incline them to wish that the new states should model their 
institutions upon the antique mould; but the prudence and 
policy of statesmen must convince them that it would be 
madness to sacrifice to such wishes the other more essential, 
more indispensable, objects, and that it is infinitely more ad- 
vantageous for them to enable the new governments to pur- 
sue steadily the designs indicated by their and by the Euro- 
pean common interest, by countenancing and contributing to 
their permanency, instead of risking by distraction the 
acquisition of an English monopoly, and thus perpetuating 
her naval ascendancy, her means of annoyance, of rendering 
commercially tributary, and thus of impoverishing, the rest of 
the world. 

The interest of England, on the contrary, her passions, 
and her prejudices, must direct her policy to keep the Ame- 
rican nations separated, weak, and in a state of war, to pre- 
vent their acquiring either a military or commercial navy, 
which might interfere with the domination of her fleets, and 
would partake with her the profits of maritime transporta- 
tion : it is her interest that they should be at war, in order 



145 

to keep up their demand for the implements of destruction 
with which she can furnish them, to prevent their having 
leisure to establish manufactures which might interfere with 
the demand that exists among them for her productions, and 
in order to prevent them from turning their attention to any- 
thing beyond the supply of the precious metals, and almost 
equally precious raw materials which she knows so well how 
to employ in those manufactories where she secures the pro- 
fit arising from the manipulation or preparing them for mar- 
ket, and whence issue the staples which enable her to tax 
the world. It is her interest to seize and fortify the great 
intermediate points of commerce, such as Cuba and the 
other West Indian islands, as she has seized Gibraltar, Malta, 
the Ionian isles, St Helena, and nearly all the regular com- 
mercial stopping places on the surface of the globe, in order 
to convert them into rendezvous for her fleets, points of de- 
posit, and garners into which she may collect the commerce 
of the world. The interest of England is therefore contra- 
dictory to that of America and of Europe in whatever relates 
to the affairs of the western continent ; it is her interest that 
all its inhabitants should be mere day labourers producing 
the raw materials of manufactures and commerce. 

The interest of America is to acquire such strength as 
shall enable her to preserve the external peace of every one 
of her family of nations ; and to maintain their internal tran- 
quillity, with the view of gaining time to acquire this strength, 
in order to devote herself to the establishment of a commer- 
cial navy and of armed fleets, so that she may by the one 
place herself in a situation to transport her productions with- 
out being obliged to concede to foreigners the profits of her 
carrying trade, and by the other may be competent to de- 
fend that commerce ; it is her interest to be strong and that 
her governments should not experience any convulsions, in 
order that they and her inhabitants should have an oppor- 
tunity to devote themselves to the perfection of the agricul- 
ture and the arts she already possesses, and to devise and 
establish the multitude of other resources of wealth and of 
real independence, which are offered to her industry by the 
variety and beneficence of her climates and soils: above all^ 



146 

quiet is necessary to her in order to gain time for the natural 
increase of her population, which has been seriously aifect- 
ed, in some of the countries at least, by the recent war. It 
is too evident to require demonstration that none of these 
advantages can be so well improved in time of civil disturb- 
ance or of foreign war as during a season of tranquillity and 
peace. She has been already too long at war and vexed 
with violent intestine commotions; she demands repose. 

It would be detrimental to America that any one European 
nation should engross her commerce, whether it is done by 
violence or by intrigue, influence, subsidies, or negociation; 
if by subsidies or by distribution of money, the sums so 
invested within her territory by a foreign nation must be 
eventually repaid in some way or other ; and if they are re- 
paid by the effect of commerce, they would still be as much 
(and probably more) to her inconvenience, as if they were 
to be refunded by actual payments in shape of stock, or of 
the paying off" of such stock ; because that kind of prospec- 
tive advantage would not be relied upon by foreign powers 
unless with a very clear certainty of deriving from thence, not 
only the principal and interest, but also a profit which should 
cover the risk and the inconvenience of the delay. England 
has for a very long time been in the habit of paying subsi- 
dies or making loans to the powers of the continent, and has 
by them added largely to her public debt ; but it is held by 
many clear sighted politicians that this inconvenience has 
been much more than counterpoised by the profit made by 
her merchants and manufacturers upon the articles sold in 
these countries under the commercial treaties which often 
accompanied those of subsidy, or by effect of the influence 
and prepossession which always, between nations as well as 
between individuals, must be the consequence of their assu- 
ming the relation of debtor and creditor. 

It would be the interest of the American states to be quiet 
for some years under any form of government ; and it is 
much more so under the forms they have adopted, which are 
probably as nearly approximative to republican institutions 
as their previous condition, the nature of their population, 
and their predominant prejudices or habits, will admit. This 



147 

interest is not however confined to the separate and individ- 
ual nations ; it is the interest of all that all and every individ- 
ual nation should be thus internally and externally tranquil, 
in order that the whole continent should derive from such 
tranquillity the benefits which will arise from it, because the 
first interest of the whole is that the continent should acquire 
such a consistency of strength and wealth as will enable the 
whole to make head against foreign imposition, and in order 
that the acquisition of such strength by each should produce 
an equilibrium between the several states which shall put it 
out of the power of any to predominate, or tyrannize over, 
or to absorb the others — to produce, in short, a balance of 
power among the American states. 

But man is a belligerent, an ambitious, and a grasping, ani- 
mal ; his natural inclinations direct him to aim at domination 
over his neighbours. It is in vain to talk of what ought to 
be ; what has been will be again under similar circumstances : 
therefore, if America does not adopt precautions, if she does 
not change the plan and the circumstances which obtained 
in Europe from remote antiquity, her destinies will be the 
same as those of Europe, her history will be a repetition 
of that of Europe, with nothing more than a change of 
names, as the history of modern Europe is a repetition of 
that of ancient Asia : one nation will make war upon another, 
for which any visions will serve for pretexts, but ambition or 
a desire for war will be the real causes ; these nations will 
form alliances with others, and they will massacre one 
another until some of the allies get tired of the contest, 
or until its great men are bought off, or until the belligerents 
are exhausted ; then they will make an ephemeral peace, 
which will last only till they are refreshed and ready to 
renew a war between the same powers, or perhaps with 
new adversaries, or until leading individuals of a new ge- 
neration, succeeding that which was at war, feel disposed 
to gain for themselves the powers and the wealth which were 
the portion, in consequence of war, of the chiefs of the ge- 
neration that preceded them. Thus m America will be ac- 
ted over the farces and the tragedies which have filled the 
scrolls of history with traces of blood and tears. 



148 



CHAPTER XX. 



A, 



.LL men agree, even those who have profited of it agree 
in their mature age, that war is a positive evil. How then 
are wars to be prevented in America, and how are the advan- 
tages of tranquillity internal and external to be secured to 
the western continent 9 These are to be secured, and those 
to be prevented, by guarantying to each nation its limits 
and its institutions, with a tribunal of delegates from each, 
which shall decide without appeal upon all subjects of con- 
troversy between them, and between them and foreign go- 
vernments, clothed with power, and having forces at the 
disposal of the tribunal, adequate to put down opposition to 
its decrees, if any should arise among the confederates, and 
of such imposing magnitude, as to overwhelm any foreign 
assailant. 

This was the design which Henry the fourth suggested 
for Europe ; which Barlow projected, almost prophetically, 
for America; and which Bolivar has officially proposed to us. 

There is no cause of quarrel on account of such a confede- 
ration, for Europe has set us the example of it in her Holy Alli- 
ance. But if there are reasons to apprehend foreign hostili- 
ties or interference in our mutual or domestic arrangements 
on that or on any other ground, they are also reasons for our 
establishing a power which may enable us to defy all danger. 
If reason and prudence, a respect for the rights of nations 
and a desire to preserve the peace of the world, be listened 
to, there would be no quarrel about it. If the confederation 



149 

be well formed, it will be too strong to quarrel with. As to 
the possibility of attacking one power by surprise, and bat- 
tering down its towns, or capturing its fleets in sight of its 
sovereign, until it consents to abandon the confederacy, chop- 
ping it asunder piecemeal, playing the game by which the 
armed coalition was dissolved, and by which Denmark lost 
her fleet, this would be prevented by putting the forces of 
the confederation at once into condition to repel aggression, 
and especially by having good intelligence of the movements 
of the maritime powers ; indeed the great distance that would 
have to be traversed by a fleet to attack these countries, and 
the magnitude of the preparations which would be necessary, 
would put it out of the power of any nation to attack them by 
surprise or before forces were collected to meet the attack. 
Besides, the example of the two attacks mentioned, and 
their consequences, are so fresh and so striking, that it can- 
not be supposed any country would be mad enough to suc- 
cumb to an attempt to dissever the confederation, if it were 
formed;' the loss of a fleet or of a town or two would be no- 
thing compared to the disadvantage of a separation, and the 
damage done for this object would be compensated by the 
confederation. Any nation, even haughty England, would 
recoil at the hazard of sending across the ocean such a fleet 
as would be requisite for the object; she could not do it 
without stripping her dock yards, and then she would be 
exposed to the natural mode of checking and at the same 
time punishing her assaults, fire and steel at Portsmouth, at 
Liverpool, or even perhaps at her boasted London; for no- 
thing can be plainer than the expediency of reciprocating 
the attack by assailing her in her vitals^ — assailing with a 
merciless war; and the sense of the world would justify it, 
because the object of the confederation being the conserva- 
tion of peace, any attack upon it, with a view towards its 
dissolution, would be a wanton and profligate inroad upon 
the first principles of justice, and would deserve the utmost 
severity of the last appeal of kings. Upon the earliest news 
therefore of the sailing of a fleet from any country to attack 
the confederation, squadrons would put to sea to rendezvous 
upon the coasts of the power making the movement, with 



150 

orders to carry fire and sword into her harbours. The ap- 
prehension of this measure would oblige the power to keep 
at home such large squadrons as to expose that which she 
should dispatch across the ocean to almost inevitable defeat. 

But this argument upon the safety of the confederation 
from foreign attack, either with the view of dismemberment 
or with any other object, is only to shew its security ; for it 
can hardly be imagined, after the universal detestation cre- 
ated by the two attacks above alluded to, that any nation 
would be so lost to a sense of the common decencies of civi- 
lization as to attempt, upon such grounds, to disturb the tran- 
quillity of a continent so remote and so disengaged from the 
affairs of the old world. It is given only to answer by 
anticipation the objection which might be made, that foreign 
nations would attempt to dissolve it, by shewing that it 
would be out of their power to effect such a design. 

The rest of the civilized world would be deprived, in Ame- 
rica at least, by the confederation, of the two principal im- 
pulses which have heretofore caused wars: the desire of 
conquest ; and fear of being conquered ; that is, the propen- 
sity to seize the possessions of others, and the desire to pre- 
vent others from reciprocally exercising the same propensity. 

The first, the appetite for acquisition by other nations, 
will have no aliment here, because the world knows, by this 
time, that none of the American nations can be conquered. 
I do not mean that their armies and fleets cannot be beaten, 
they will have at times to undergo the fortune of war; 
but no foreign government can subdue countries of almost 
unlimited extent, with scattered populations, collected in 
masses only in a few places and at remote intervals. If a 
successful inroad were made by a powerful force, it could 
hold in possession nothing beyond its line of sentries; the 
natural fortresses of the mountains, lakes, rivers, forests, and 
deserts, would afford secure refuge for the government of 
the country intcase of successful invasion ; and even if the 
persons of the governmental officers were captured, the local 
or district authorities would still be competent to carry on 
that species of war which is infinitely more formidable to in- 
vaders than pitched battles, the guerilla, the war of posts. 



151 

of bush fighting, and of incessant molestation, consuming 
daily the lives of the invaders, exhausting their strength 
by harassing alarms and constant watchfulness, and depriv- 
ing them of sustenance by intercepting their convoys from 
abroad, and by preventing their drawing supplies from the 
country, by means of lines almost imperceptible, at a distance 
from their adversaries, and intangible by regular troops. 
Mere famine would thus break down the invading army, and 
the larger the army the more certain the operation of this 
system, while a small force would be liable to be overwhelm- 
ed by the numbers brought to bear upon it. This system in 
fact is calculated to give efficiency to the inhabitants of the 
country, and militia are as useful in it as regular troops ; 
it gives fearful odds in point of numbers, for it converts the 
whole population of a country into an army to assail the 
invaders. 

Conquest is therefore out of the question in America. The 
only mode of obtaining an ascendancy here by a foreign 
power is general corruption, and the excitement of an in- 
clination, a partiality, and an adherence to the foreigners 
among the great body of the people ; a position whose ab- 
surdity is too apparent to require discussion; for whatever 
might be the case with a few leaders, it can never be sup- 
posed that the great majority of a nation can feel partiality 
for strangers, much less for those who invade them in arms ; 
nor can it be imagined that the finances of any nation would 
suffice to the corruption of the mass of another people, par- 
ticularly of people richer in metallic wealth than any other 
in the world, and who supply the materials for the current 
medium of all others. 

The first and strongest inducement which leads the great 
men of a nation to desire war, the inclination for conquest, 
is then obviated as regards America; and with it are oblite- 
rated its appendant passions, thirst for glory, desire for ce- 
lebrity, for acquiring rank by means of renown, and for 
accumulating wealth by means of spoil, appropriation of ter- 
ritories, or in shape of rewards for services : permanent 
conquest is out of the question, the commanders of invading 
forces would have to look for defeat, starvation, and disgrace,. 



152 

in lieu of success, honours, and the spoliaopima; they would 
therefore be very little inclined to try the experiment which 
in other countries has raised the sword to the highest ho- 
nours and to wealth ; the stimulants, the probabilities, which 
impel ambitious men abroad to trouble the repose of their 
neighbours, are wanting here; and of course there is little 
probability that enterprises designed for conquest will be 
undertaken against us. 

The second great incentive to war is the apprehension 
(or the pretext of it) of attempts at conquest by another 
party. This can never exist in Europe with respect to Ame- 
rica. The vast extent of our territories leaves us nothing to 
desire in this respect; it would be the height of folly in any 
American nation to wish an extension of her possessions, for 
what each already owns vi^ill not be populated for ages, even 
sufficiently for the comfort of the inhabitants. It is not the 
common people with whom the desire of conquest ever ori- 
ginates; such an inclination begins with the chiefs of the 
country, and is excited among the people by them with the 
greatest difficulty. Although there may be found among us 
some leading men either embarrassed in circumstances, or 
who are not possessed of domains equal to their wishes, yet 
all who own more land than is sufficient to their own perso- 
nal cultivation must perceive that their property can rise in 
value and in productiveness only as the country fills with 
inhabitants, and that if more territory be acquired by their 
nations new avenues for dispersing the population will be 
opened, and by this means for diminishing the value of their 
estates ; wealth has universally an influence, and all men of 
wealth, all who are at their ease, in the American states, must 
be opposed to extending the territorial possessions of their 
governments ; interest is so evident in this particular that it 
may be relied upon with certainty. As to the governments, 
they will have enough to do to keep and to improve the soil 
they already possess ; it is much more likely that they will 
undergo subdivisions than that they will attempt to enlarge 
the territories which they have. If our people inhabited cold 
and unproductive climates, as did those barbarians whose 
hordes overran all Europe of old in search of warm suns and 



153 

prolific lands, if any thing were to be gained by expatria- 
tion, there might be some colour for apprehensions of large 
armed emigrations, although the spaces to be traversed on 
the ocean would be ten times as large as those which were 
crossed by the conquering Normans, and although the diffi- 
culty of finding vessels enough to carry them on such long 
voyages would be almost insuperable. But what induce- 
ment could be presented for change of residence to people 
inhabiting the most delicious climates on earth, whose soils 
yield almost spontaneously the richest productions of nature, 
and whose mountains scarcely conceal in their entrails the 
metals, the accursed gold, the evil tempting silver, and jew- 
els the gaud of vanity or pride, which have been the objects 
of the covetousness and of the passions of mankind since 
their earliest creation. 

Whatever then may be the temptations for some nations 
of America to desire to occupy the territories of others in 
the same continent, there never can be any inducement for 
them to aim at foreign conquests ; and upon this head the 
prudence or foresight of Europe will render her perfectly 
tranquil. 

In saying this however I must not be taken to anticipate 
the subject of Cuba, of which hereafter. 

That conquest in America by foreign powers cannot be 
effected is very certain ; but the question of conquest of one 
nation by them in concert with another nation of the same 
continent is a very different affair. If the American states are 
divided, if they place themselves exactly upon the footing with 
respect to one another on which the nations are in other parts 
of the world, if they do not take advantage of the experience 
of past ages, and of their present anomalous situation, and 
provide a method by which the contingency of future disputes 
may be settled, by which a bond of mutual interest may be 
wound round them, and by which their sympathies may be 
united into a sort of enlarged nationality, if they do not adopt 
measures which shall constitute them an exception to the 
general precedent, to the heretofore universal routine of na- 
tional history, they must and will undergo the lot which has 



154 

befallen all other nations, they must and will go through the 
same train of events which has been followed by all the na- 
tions that have preceded them, and their history will be 
nothing more than a repetition, altering only names and dates, 
of that of every people whose annals are before us. While 
time and opportunity invite, nay woo, her to be wise, if Amer- 
ica does not profit of the occasion, and take precautions, 
which the lapse of a very short period will place irrevocably 
beyond her control, to guard against the occurrence of all 
the events that have happened to other nations, she will 
like them see her fertile fields converted into bloody arenas 
of conflict, her towns will be circumscribed with walls and 
ramparts, to serve for the concentration of her strength, 
for schools for the science of slaughter, and for the scenes 
of reiterated sieges, as has occurred before, all over the earth. 
If she does not take those precautions, she will be exposed 
to the reiteration of past examples of alliances between some 
of her governments and foreign, even ultra marine, powers, 
against others of her nations, disguising under pretexts of 
resentment for injuries illy concealed designs of conquest 
and partition. In such cases, the weaker nation attacked on 
its sea bord from abroad, and invaded upon its interior fron- 
tiers by a people familiar with the climate and skilful as its 
own inhabitants in all the modes of attack and defence pe- 
culiar to this continent, accustomed to the topography of 
similar regions, and identical in habits, resources, and vi- 
gour — in such cases indeed conquest in America will depend 
only upon the fortune of war, and in such cases American 
nations may be divided, rent asunder, into fragments, tri- 
butary to their neighbours on the same continent, or colo- 
nies again to European monarchies. Conquests cannot }gie 
effected here by foreign powers ; but they may be effected 
by these aided by American allies. They will fight for it 
no doubt, and bravely, the clarion of fame will resound the 
glories of victorious chieftains, and will fatigue the echoes 
of the world with the mournful eulogies of fallen heroes ; but 
how much more glorious, how much more splendid to the 
rejoicing ear of civilized and pious humanity, will be the 



155 

praises of those pacific triumphs which diffuse happiness, 
wealth, prosperity, and comfort over flourishing countries, 
which extend the victories of art over the crude materials 
lavishly offered by prolific nature, which clothe, instruct, 
and embellish the existence of whole nations, and which will 
be the effect of such an arrangement, such a continental 
confederation, as shall unite the two Americas, shall inter- 
dict mutual wars, and shall interpose a tenfold buckler 
between the nations of the continent and foreign violence. 
I have alluded above to the possibility of a desire being 
excited in some of the American nations to acquire the 
territories of others, or to add them to their own dominions. 
That such will be the case, from time to time, we must an- 
ticipate not only from the inherent disposition of mankind, 
but also from every thing that appears in the records of their 
past actions ; no nation has yet formed an exception ; the 
Assyrians covered in the clouds of remote antiquity, the 
English, polished France, the more than half civilized 
Aztec, and the wild Cherokee, the wide Germanic empire, 
and even Genoa, circumscribed within her narrow limits, all 
ages, and all nations, large or small, civilized or barbarous, 
have given proofs of the universality of the passion for con- 
quest, of the predominance of this ravenous disposition to 
seize the territories belonging to others. Shall we differ 
from the rest of the human race ; shall we alone be exempted 
from the excesses of this plunderrng mania ; shall we mono- 
polize the feeble remnant of the principles of justice and re- 
spect for the rights of others, which yet hnger on earth ; and 
shall we alone be excepted from the prevalence of the dispo- 
sition to incroach upon our neighbours which has characte- 
rized all our predecessors 9 A knowledge of our own tempe- 
rament, the records of past time, the nature and the character 
of man, forbid the most sanguine to hope for the realization 
of such Utopian visions : if we could thus dream, unfortu- 
nately there are too many and recent instances militating^ 
against them even in the short history of the United States, 
where we have seen that the power of the whole confede- 
ration is called upon sometimes to interpose its overwhelm- 
ing authority to prevent one state from taking possession 



156 

of a paltry island, a sand bar in the midst of the waves* ; 
sometimes to settle a pretension to extensive regions in the 
heart of a statef ; sometimes to determine a frontier J ; and 
sometimes to protect the miserable remnant of the aboriginal 
possessors of the country against the impetuous violence of 
individuals who hunger after the contracted vestiges of their 
ancient sovereignties^. Happy is it for us that the wisdom 
of our fathers devised a method, and that the good sense of the 
present generation preserves with a holy reverence the means, 
by which such desires are repressed, and by which passions 
are curbed, without appeal to the sword ; the inevitable con- 
quence of them, unless that wisdom, and that good sense, 
had anticipated such events, had provided by the confedera- 
tion the security against conflict, and had endued the cen- 
tral authority with power and force to restrain any encroach- 
ments upon the rights or disturbances of the peace of the 
parties to the great compact, and to maintain the internal 
tranquillity of the whole system. But if we see these things, 
these effervescences, take place in so well poised a system as 
ours, we can not expect that they will not occur among the 
varied and discordant elements which compose the nations of 
the two continents, unless we imitate the splendid example 
of this confederation, and adopt some plan, as nearly analo- 
gous as circumstances will permit, for preserving the general 
harmony. Without it, the temptations are so provoking, the 
inducements are so great, the spoil so alluring, and the faci- 
lities so inviting, that the continent will never enjoy ten 
years together of peace. The character and disposition of the 
inhabitants of both Americas are already quite sufficiently 
martial; and when the tumultuous elements are roused into 
action, when the people become familiarized with war, the 
mass of combustible materials will be immensely increased, 
and will be added to the constantly existing causes for war. A 
state of war, above all wars of invasion or of internal defence, 



* E. g. The Pea Patch. 

t Luzerne and Lycoming counties in Pennsylvania. 
X On the Hudson between New York and New Jersey. 
§ As in the instance of Georgia and the Creeks. 



15T 

frontier war, are inconsistent with republican institutions ; the 
army must have the ascendancy ; in such wars it is too neces- 
sary to be otherwise ; the commanders must have nearly abso- 
lute power, and the army must be attached to them, else they, 
and it, can not suffice to the very oljjects of their existence : 
the army and a large one, becomes an indispensable portion of 
the government and of society ; and with it are introduced 
martial principles and a habitude of military obedience. It is 
impossible therefore for any one to flatter himself that a repub- 
lican form of government can endure in America in the midst 
of the continual wars which must prevail, if measures are not 
adopted to prevent their occurrence: in fact we see and know 
from example that republics contend with great disadvan- 
tage against military governments, and as yet all have been 
overcome ; those in Greece, Rome, and Holland, are instan- 
ces, if those aristocratic oligarchies can be called republics. 
The American nations are the only real republics the world 
has ever seen ; and if we wish that this beautiful model of 
theoretical perfection in government should last beyond the 
present generation, or even last for our own lives, we must in 
common prudence take precautions to prevent the occur- 
rence of these events, and the fermentation of those causes, 
which have, down to our own age, been the destruction of 
every thing that bore a resemblance, however slight, to the 
institutions to which we are all, or at least to which every 
man here professes to be, attached. 

When any one has a favourite idea which occupies his 
mind with an absolute conviction, it assumes to his eyes the 
qualities of an axiom. Such is to my mind the necessity of a 
general confederation among the American states; and de- 
monstration of this, to me self evident, truth seems equivalent 
to a train of argument to convince others of the accuracy 
of the position that twice two make four, and I feel the same 
difficulty in proving the one by reasoning, that I should have 
in demonstrating the certainty of the other; at every instant 
while I write, things to corroborate my position occur to me 
which I reject as too trite, too common place, too universally 
known, to be admitted into a grave discussion; this is the 
inevitable consequence of a deep conviction of the truth of 
V 



158 

what one dwells upon. But at the same time I do not cease 
to protest that I am the last person in the world to deny to 
others the privilege which I claim for myself as an indepen- 
dent member of society, that of judging for one's self and of 
frankly expressing an opinion, without intolerance and with- 
out ascribing improper motives to those who differ from one 
in opinion : thus, although either proposition, that two and 
two make four, or that a confederation of the American 
nations is absolutely necessary to gain and to secure every 
thing which men value, strikes me as equally self evident, and 
equally difficult to make plainer by demonstration, yet I 
should as soon pretend to censure a man for not perceiving 
the truth of the one as of the other. However I must still 
go on to accumulate arguments for the confederation, with 
all the disadvantage of a consciousness that they bear the 
same appearance of awkwardness that would be worn by 
arguments to prove the truth of the first axiom in Euclid, 
for to my eyes the truth of both is equally manifest. 

As the world stands, commerce is an indispensable want 
of all nations which pretend to civilization. Among the eight 
hundred millions of souls who inhabit the globe, the human 
intellect is continually in action, is continually making dis- 
coveries, and is incessantly giving publicity to such disco- 
veries either of inventions for the first time made, or of 
improvements upon the ideas, and inventions of the past 
generations. A nation without intercourse with the rest of the 
world would have no more to go upon than the stock of in- 
tellect contained among its own inhabitants; but one which 
is in correspondence with the whole mass of its contempora- 
ries, drawing from them their varied sources of information, 
brings in fact to bear upon its own concerns the intellect 
of the whole human race; so that a nation of three millions 
of souls isolated from the rest of the world would have only 
three million minds occupied in devising expedients for 
advancing its prosperity; but a nation which maintains 
correspondences by means of commerce with the rest of 
mankind profits of the intellect of eight hundred millions of 
reasoning and intelligent beings. This alone would be a 
sufficient argument in favour of commerce. If a continent 



159 

containing sixteen millions of souls should suffer its cotn- 
merce to be monopolized by a nation of twenty millions of 
inhabitants, it would of course only have the benefit of the 
•inventions on the accumulated knowledge of its own sixteen 
millions and of those twenty millions, making an aggregate 
of the intellect and information of thirty-six millions, instead 
of eight hundred millions. No other proof is necessary of 
the expediency of a nation or of a continent extending its 
commercial intercourse so as to be participated in by all the 
countries of the world ; nor is it necessary to add a treatise 
upon the equalization of trade, the keeping down prices of 
the importations, and the enhancement of the value of the ex- 
ports by means of the competition between traders from dif- 
ferent countries. I have heretofore gone so much at large 
into the demonstration of the probability that England will 
monopolize, by means of her vast marine and unlimited ma- 
nufactures, the commerce of the cidevant Spanish colonies, 
unless measures are adopted to guard against such an event, 
that it seems hardly requisite to enlarge upon the subject. 

But it is necessary to show the immediate inconvenience 
to these United States of the absence of such precautionary 
measures, and, by inference, the necessity of the confedera- 
tion 1 advocate, which is, as I believe, the only precaution 
that the nature of things and the passions of mankind ad- 
mit. 

When our revolution broke out the country was much 
divided in sentiment, a formidable portion of it maintaining 
an affection, which was singular enough, for the mother coun- 
try ; to give one example only, the legislature of Pennsylva- 
nia prescribed to her delegates in congress, in the winter of 
1775 — 6, a course of conduct opposed to ideas of indepen- 
dence; and yet the patriotism of this great state was never 
doubled. The propensity towards England survived, in the 
breasts of many, the war of the revolution : at its close, to 
the astonishment of the present generation, we perceive that 
the remnant of colonial prejudices had preserved among part 
of the inhabitants, some portion of that extraordinary and 
durable antipathy which has existed for ages among the 
English race towards France, even although without the 



160 

support of the French our struggle would probably have 
had a different termination : when the contest ceased, Eng- 
land was ready, with her immense commerce and her unli- 
mited resources for manufacturing, to take advantage of the* 
newly opened market; she did profit of it with vigour and 
with the most tempting inducements; thereby she verified the 
predictions of Dr Price that North America independent 
would not cease to be tributary to England, but would yield 
her a more ample profit, from the perquisites of commerce, 
and a larger revenue, by means of the revenue derived from 
the customs upon that commerce, than she ever drew from 
the colonies while they continued to acknowledge her su- 
premacy. The consequence has been, and is, that our trade 
with her and her colonies equals about the half of the whole 
of our commerce. There can be but one reason for this; 
which is to be found in the scarcely latent predisposition for 
England — a predisposition, a prejudice, which still imports 
our fashions, our tastes, our literature, even part of our poli- 
tics and political economy, along with her dry goods : we 
carry it so far that we are humbuged, (if I may permit my- 
self so coarse an expression) by the set speeches in her par- 
liament, intended for publication and exportation, arguing 
that it is better for nations, abounding in raw materials and 
abundantly able to manufacture them for their own use, to 
import the manufactured articles, after having exported the 
crude material, paying for them when manipulated the ad- 
vanced price incident to their additional value when they 
have had applied to them the labour of preparation for use : 
some of us believe the dicta of her chancellor of the ex- 
chequer that it will be beneficial to other nations to adopt 
a perfect equality of duties, to abolish all commercial re- 
strictions reciprocally with her, the nation which owns more 
than twice as much shipping as ourselves, and which has in 
operation machinery for manufacturing equivalent to the 
power of two hundred millions of human hands : some of us 
are persuaded by her secretary for foreign affairs that it would 
be to our advantage to make no distinction between our own 
vessels carrying cargoes from hence to her islands, and bring- 
ing cargoes directly back, and her vessels which bring from 



161 

her ports cargoes of dry goods, purchase with the proceeds 
cargoes of grain costing not the half of what they imported, 
carrying this grain to the islands and taking cargoes, thence 
home, to renew this triple voyage and triple freight. If we, 
an enlightened people, a sensible people, a reasoning people, 
have among us many influential persons who can give cre- 
dence to such stuff, to such errant charlatanerie, and if we 
have and still continue to draw our supplies of many arti- 
cles, cloths for instance, which could and can be supplied to 
us of better quality and at lower prices by other nations, par- 
ticularly by France — if we have still upon us the scars left 
by our colonial fetters, are we not led by common sense to 
anticipate that attempts will be made to captivate the affec- 
tion of the rich regions just opened to the commercial en- 
terprise of the world, and are we not impelled by every dic- 
tate of policy and of forethought to endeavour to prevent 
the effect of such attempts "? 

The fact is that the vestiges of our colonial servitude are 
deeper than we are disposed to confess, the declaration of 
independence to the contrary notwithstanding : we are violent 
enough in declamation about our independence ; but, as I 
have observed elsewhere, who at this time of day cares 
for speeches'? deeds, actions, are the only proofs; and of 
the declaimers I say, " by their fruits ye shall know them." 
If I am to be reigned over, I had rather it should be by 
George the fourth than by Huskisson or Canning : if I must 
be fettered, let my limbs be bound, but for heaven's sake do 
not attempt to fetter the mind. Let us put an end to this 
colonizing of the intellect : for if such a state of things is to 
continue, what a farce it is to pretend to be legislating for 
ourselves. It is true that acts of parliament have not the force 
of laws, but articles in the Quarterly have. We could hardly 
be kept out of an alliance when France and England went 
to war; indeed we were like to massacre one another to 
determine the question of alliance, and with which power; 
and yet we were only remotely and contingently interested : 
the impulse in this instance began abroad, it was imported : 
again, we followed the cry of the English radicals about the 
Holy Alliance, having really little to do with it; or if some 



162 

of the English, the true John Bulls, were right, that alliance 
is of great value to us, because it will infallibly restrain the 
outrageous maritime pretensions of Great Britain, and this 
is the secret of their virulence against it. In short, Europe 
is posterity in our eyes — we look across the water to see 
the impression which our acts are to produce, and England 
especially sends us politics with her pattern cards ; sometimes 
her ministerialists, and more generally her opposition party, 
dictate to us; both of them, with respect to foreign relations, 
English to the back bone. This colonial propensity is pro- 
bably one reason why some of us are indifferent or averse to 
the design of an American alliance ; and we cannot more 
effectually serve England, we cannot renew our allegiance 
to her more faithfully, than by refusing to unite with the 
rest of our own continent. In the name of our country, in 
the name of our national pride, in name of the judgment of 
posterity, let; us for once at least dare to be thoroughly and 
independently American. 

It is a singular mark of the durability of our colonial ves- 
tiges, so much to be deplored, and which leads us to look over 
the sea for approval or disapprobation of what we do, that 
the discontinuance of our embassies of the first grade in 
South America has been seriously spoken of, when we have 
so deep an interest in that quarter, and have to expect im- 
measurable intercourse, as well as political and commercial 
relations there, while we do not even meditate any change in 
our diplomatic intercourse with the greater European go- 
vernments, mere zeros in politics in relation to us, when 
compared with the importance of South America. I am 
not in favour of maintaining any thing short of high diplo- 
macy with the European powers, if for no other object than 
that of rigid watchfulness ; but every reason of sound policy 
dictates that we should have ministers of the first class near 
the new governments of this continent : the object of con- 
tributing to their respectability in the eyes of the world would 
be a sufficient cause for this, if we had no other. 

It is in vain, and every page of history shews it, to reason 
from the apparent interest alone of nations ; this has been said 
before, and I renew the assertion j passion, prejudice, and 



163 

caprice govern men more than interest ; if we take a different 
view, we must to support it assume that the majority of man- 
kind are well informed, have strong perception of the truth 
of obscure and profound topics, and draw wise conclusions. 
If mere interest governed men, why are not our seaports 
supplied with bread stuffs from the Black sea, whence we 
might draw wheat which would not cost more than thirty- 
seven cents the bushel delivered here. 

It is our true policy then to attach Hispano- America to us 
by the bonds of affection, of sympathy, and of prejudice, as 
well as by interest, in order to obtain their custom for as 
large a portion of our agricultural and manufactured articles 
as we are able to spare or as may be adapted to their con- 
sumption, and to secure to ourselves the advantage of so 
much of their carrying trade as they are not able to furnish 
transportation for themselves. We may at this moment 
conciliate their warmest affections, and thus obtain a prefe- 
rence in their demand for imported articles, while we secure 
also their preference of our vessels to transport their com- 
modities. If we do not take measures of this character, 
England will : we see already that she is attempting to bribe 
them high for the object ; she has lent them enormous pub- 
lic and private loans, and she is spreading wide ramifications 
of influence through their territories, in shape of mining asso- 
ciations and even colonies ; both of which not only purchase 
adherence by the disbursements of large sums of money, but 
also perpetuate it by holding out the prospect of annual pro- 
fit from the same sources, and in addition, these measures cre- 
ate a personal influence by bringing the agents into immediate 
contact with the body of the people*. It is worthy also of 
remark that whatever propensity for herself England was 
able to excite here, was brought into activity after the close 
of a violent war, and of course it had to overcome the exacer- 
bation created by that war. But England has no such feel- 
ings to encounter in the Hispano- American states ; she has 



* I am informed by a high authority that not less than $ 16,000,000 have 
been actually invested, and paid, by English companies, in mining speculations ; 
without estimating the nominal unpaid capitals of those companies. 



164 

scarcely ever appeared to them, but in a beneficiary light ; 
before their revolution they knew her as constantly endeav- 
ouring to break the rigorous system of commercial and poli- 
tical interdiction and non-intercourse enacted by the mother 
country, thus attempting to supply them with articles of lux- 
ury and indulgence in spite of their mistress ; they knew her 
as the furnisher of the slaves they wanted, under the infernal 
Assiento contract which this nation (now preaching almost 
servile war against all governments which own slaves, and 
overwhelming them with fanatical abuse on that account) 
seemed to have principally in view in one at least of the wars 
she waged against Spain, as much with a design, as is proba- 
ble from the course she pursued, of taking advantage of the 
facilities the contract afforded for introducing her goods and 
manufactures, as with the purpose of deriving the profit from 
the sale of the slaves she supplied. Since the revolution 
began England has continued to appear to the Mexicans and 
South Americans with an agreeable and conciliating aspect 
by in fact permitting her subjects, whatever mere statutory or 
diplomatic declarations she made upon the subject, to take 
an active part in the war by serving as officers or even in 
whole regiments or crews, by selling to them ships of war 
and afterwards fighting in them, by supplying large loans at 
the moment when the war turned upon the point of money 
and must have ceased without it, at last by continuing to 
lend to the governments or to individuals, and by making 
establishments for mining and other objects alike beneficial 
to the resources of the governments and to the general pros- 
perity of the countries. It is nothing to say that all these 
were not operations of the English government, but of indi- 
viduals ; the government might have prevented them if averse 
to the system ; they arose from the genius and system of the 
nation. Very likely these measures were not the execution 
of a deep laid, well designed, and digested scheme by which 
all details of execution were specifically laid down and dif- 
ferent operations designated to be pursued in different con- 
tingencies ; such design would oblige one to attribute much 
greater talents than I am disposed to ascribe to the ministry, 
although I am far from denying them to possess very con- 



165 

siderable talents. But there is one predominant principle in 
English politics which savours strongly of the maxim as- 
cribed by an old poet to a father, "get money my son, 
fairly if you can, but get money." Thus the impulse, the 
grand object of the English nation, is to introduce her trade 
and to employ her money, and her ships, every where ; the 
details of this design are only applications of the principle 
to the various conjunctures as they successively arise. The 
loans to the new states possibly were originally begun as 
speculations by individuals upon their own mere motion ; but 
it seems difficult to believe that millions upon millions should 
be so employed without a secret understanding with the go- 
vernment ; at any rate loans of such amounts, and enterprizes 
of such extent, could not have been made without the go- 
vernment being perfectly informed of their negociation; and 
not having been forbidden by the government, they were 
made with its connivance at least. But upon whatever 
grounds commenced and carried on, the effect is the same, 
the English nation and English trade acquire such an in- 
fluence there as promises to secure, if not a monopoly, at least 
a share of the commerce and of political influence much lar- 
ger than would naturally fall to England, and demanding 
vigorous measures on the part of other nations interested to 
prevent an undue and unreasonable ascendancy of that com- 
merce and those politics. 

The United States, however, have also always appeared in 
positions with respect to Mexico and South America, which 
exhibited us in a favourable light to the eyes of the inhabi- 
tants : they have drawn from us large supplies of munitions 
of war and of subsistence, very useful in carrying on the con- 
test; and as we were the first to recognize their acts of inde- 
pendence, this alone would necessarily leave a favourable 
impression upon their minds. We shewed the value of inde- 
pendence, and demonstrated by our example the way to ac- 
quire it. They are not, as they themselves declare, insensi- 
ble of this benefit. They have imitated our institutions and 
forms of government as closely as they could under the circum- 
stances in which they were placed, and as nearly as the cha- 
racter of their populations admitted ; of the advantages they 
W 



166 

have hence derived they have also acknowledged their sense, 
A continental sympathy, a similarity of origin, a common 
destiny, seem to draw all the nations of America together 
with bonds of fraternal affection. We have one advantage 
over England in never having inflicted the slightest evil 
upon South America; whereas they can not even yet en- 
tirely forget the ruthless incursions of the Buccaneers, who 
were chiefly Englishmen or at least were called so by them, 
nor the outrages of those naval commanders who defaced 
the towns and the maritime frontiers with fire, and stained 
the pages of the history of their own country with blood 
wantonly shed, and spoils unrelentingly seized. We stand 
untarnished, uncensured, in their sight ; we have never done 
them injury : nor have we ever, as a nation, given them the 
least cause of offence ; on the contrary all our relations with 
them hitherto have been characterized with affection and 
conciliation ; for the effusions of one or two enthusiastic, not 
to say violent, men on the ffoor of congress cannot be, nor 
ought to be, considered as any thing more than the efferves- 
cences of individuals in direct opposition to the sentiments 
of the whole mass of the population of the United States. 

The Hispano-American colonies are situated with regard 
to their mother country, differently from the position in 
which we found ourselves at the close of our revolution, in 
relation to England. We had been in the habit of using, 
and of course felt a kind of necessity for, the manufactures 
of England, who was the first manufacturing and commer- 
cial nation in the world, able and eager to furnish us with 
every thing that we could or would purchase from her. Spain 
on the contrary is only a very secondary manufacturer, and 
now can scarcely be called a commercial nation. The cot- 
tons, cloths, iron, and most other articles demanded by South 
America must be furnished by other nations, and were most 
of them furnished to Spain to be transported at an advanced 
price to her colonies before their emancipation. Their wants 
are in future to be supplied from those other nations without 
the interposition of the mother country, a change vastly to 
their advantage. They have not therefore the same induce- 
ment that we had, for renewing their old commercial rela- 



167 

tions ; and the question is not between them and the mother 
country, as in our case, abundantly capable to suffice to all 
their demands ; but it is a competition between other coun- 
tries, able to supply them, to determine which shall supply 
those demands, whether for manufactures or productions, or 
for the transportation of their equivalents until they have 
vessels enough of their own to carry for themselves. 

This question is mainly between England and ourselves ; 
and it depends, in my opinion, almost altogether upon the 
course we shall adopt with respect to the confederation. If 
we now shake them from us, if we repel their affectionate 
advances, and thus mortify equally their national pride and 
their natural feelings, it appears that their inevitable course 
will be to throw their commerce with all its golden advan- 
tages into the lap of the nation which is wooing their attach- 
ment with the most pointed attentions, and which is lavish- 
ing money and influence to induce them to fall into her arms 
open to receive them with the titmost cordiality. 

I will not go so far as to say that, if we become a party to 
the confederation, we shall monopolize the whole commerce 
of America; I do not know that it would be in all points 
of view desirable that we should do so; because then what- 
ever improvements those countries are to derive from abroad 
would come to them through our medium, and it has been 
before attempted to be shewn that it is best for nations to have 
intercourse with all the world, in order that they may import 
the new ideas and the knowledge which are furnished by the 
whole human race ; and for ourselves, for our own interest, 
even without any philanthropic views, we must desire that the 
nations with whom we have commercial relations should pro- 
gress in the grand march of refinement and civilization, should 
devise new cultivations, and create new productions, so that 
new staples may be afforded to be exchanged with what we 
can supply to them, so that they may have new wants or de- 
sires, and so that our commerce with them may be extended. 
We have seen that after newly discovered countries have been 
gleaned of what precious metals or valuable products of the 
chase they have on hand to barter for the beads or looking 
glasses exhibited to their admiration by the first commercial 



168 

enterprizes which reach their shores, commerce with them 
flags, until, having acquired a taste for the products of foreign 
industry, they apply themselves to raising articles to exchange 
for other articles of whose existence they were ignorant 
during their unsophisticated condition, or discover and bring 
to market woods, dyes, or minerals, previously of little value 
in their eyes. Thus intercourse with foreigners creates in- 
dustry, and new tastes, improves the condition of a people, 
and benefits equally themselves and those with whom they 
have intercourse. The well known picture of a people in 
the rudiment of intercourse with foreigners is presented, be- 
cause it is the most striking which can be given : but the 
same principle obtains in all stages of a nation's existence ; we, 
as well as the South Americans and Mexicans, are annually de- 
manding for our consumption articles which were not known 
to common use until recently. Let me give one singular 
instance which at first glance may appear trifling, but which 
is immediately in point; Leghorn bonnets and hats were, un- 
til within a few years, articles of luxury confined to the sea- 
bord and to the wealthiest ; they are now in frequent use in 
the interior at hundreds of miles from the sea, among persons 
whose wealth would not have formerly permitted them to 
hope for such a species of finery ; and the demand for them 
has created a new and profitable industry, giving bread, and 
even ease, to a part of the population which previously was 
without a profitable object for application of their labour, 
but which now obtains comfortable livelihood by manufac- 
turing from native grasses, imitations of the imported article 
which are little disparaged by comparison with it. This 
small item in the national industry will serve to prove the 
position, that those articles of foreign luxury which are in- 
troduced in consequence of a general intercourse with the 
rest of the world tend to diffuse a general spirit of refine- 
ment, to create a demand for other enjoyments, to awaken 
the enterprize and industry of the people, to furnish new 
objects of commerce by that industry, to improve the condi- 
tion and the manner of living among the people at large, and 
to extend commerce by creating new staples, at the same 
time that the effect of the whole system is highly beneficial to 



169 

the habits and of course to the morals of the country. Upon 
these grounds, if there were none other, we ought to wish 
that those nations, with whom we expect to have large cor- 
respondence, should not be contracted to narrow bounds in 
their intercourse with other regions. Perhaps also we are 
not yet entirely prepared to supply all the objects demanded 
by the new states ; and if the present mode of regulating 
commerce continues to prevail, the countries which produce 
those things that we have not will take measures to prevent 
their being carried by us. 

I will not say therefore that we can or ought to monopo- 
lize the trade of the new states, but if we attach them to us, 
mere prejudice, or an habitual preference, will insure to us 
a larger share of their commerce than is given to any other 
power. To go into a demonstration of the immense impor- 
tance of this commerce would be as superfluous a task as to 
attempt by enumerating the properties of day light to shew 
that the sun is a source of benefit to the world. 

Interest alone does not exclusively influence commerce j 
we could have purchased many things cheaper from France, 
at the consummation of our independence, than from Eng- 
land, and yet we did not. The first steps are those which 
influence the future destinies of commerce. When corres- 
pondences are established, when the state of the markets is 
known, where to send, where to buy, whom to address, and 
when the intercourse is once arranged, it is difficult for the 
mercantile world to be brought to a change ; they would have 
to alter their whole system and to begin de novo, with all the 
inconvenience of creating anew every branch of their busi- 
ness ; it is so much easier to go on in the old beaten path, 
that it is pursued by the generality without much variety. 
Commerce does fluctuate it is true ; but a total change is 
the work of generations : how long was England engaged in 
intrigues and even violences before she could displace the 
Dutch from their commercial ascendancy *? In our case we 
should have a still more difficult task, for we should be 
obliged to compete with a people who are fertile in expe- 
dients, attentive to every thing which tends to disseminate a 
taste for their productions, adapting them to the lightest ca- 



170 

prices of those with whom they deal, printing upon muslins 
fac similes of our declaration of independence, and likenes- 
ses of those chiefs by whom their armies have been beaten, 
in order to sell them to us— what expedients have they not 
resorted to "? — and moreover they are a people to the full 
as industrious as ourselves. We should then find it almost 
impossible to supplant England if she acquired a precedence 
over us in the South American and Mexican markets ; and 
we can get it there only by attaching those nations to us. 
Why should they give us a preference without an induce- 
ment upon our part, when there is another nation both able 
and willing to supply all their wants, anxious to purchase 
their good will at almost any price, and which will eagerly 
enter into any sort of alliance with them, leaving us to enjoy 
our own precious conceit of magnificent unconcern. If we 
get thoroughly established in those markets we cannot be dis- 
placed without a long series of events certainly not to be 
expected, nor without the operation of causes which can not 
effect a rudimental change in commercial affairs in fifty years : 
to quote the Dutch again, all the intrigues and all the artil- 
lery of England did not force them to give way to her ascen- 
dancy in nearly twice fifty years, nor until England herself 
put a Dutch king on her throne ; yet that nation at the period 
of their greatest commerce cannot be compared with us, 
because they were merely merchants, carriers of foreign 
goods, with scarcely agriculture enough to feed their people, 
and not containing the fourth of the amount of manufactures 
that we now do. But if England gets possession of the south- 
ern market, and pursues a reasonable course of conciliation, 
I do not see how we are to displace her; we cannot under- 
work her ; for it is only in the produce of machinery that we 
can equal her, nor can we do this absolutely, because ma- 
chinery is made more cheaply in England than among us ; 
we can supply the works with some raw materials, say cot- 
ton and dyes, at rather less price than she has to pay for 
them, because she is obliged to import while we grow them; 
of course their freight adds to their cost, and this brings 
the cost of the manufacture nearly upon an equality, by af- 
fording an offset to the superior price of the machinery : in 



171 

other articles, requiring manual labour, she has the advan- 
tage of lower wages for the workmen, and in them we have 
nothing to set off but the additional price they must bring 
to meet the expense of more distant transportation. We 
know that she has betaken herself to various arts to place her 
manufactures upon an equality with ours where they have a 
preference ; cotton goods are those to which I particularly 
allude, which we have been able to afford at prices a shade 
less than Hers of similar quality, and she has even counter- 
feited the American manufacturer's brands. How then are 
we to compete in a foreign market with a nation which we 
cannot undersell, after that nation has got possession of the 
market, as well as of the dispositions of the people with 
whom she deals, and when she is wide awake to every mea- 
sure which may make either for her interest or against it'? If 
we could even undersell her one or two per cent, that ad- 
vantage would not be enough to make it worth the while of 
the southern merchants to alter their system of trade and 
their correspondences. 

We shall be placed in a pretty situation, if England be- 
comes a party to their alliance, as she most likely will, after 
the southern states have formed a confederation among 
themselves. This is so evidently the true play of England, 
that it seems an inevitable consequence of our refusing to join 
in the alliance, and she is not the nation to overlook such an 
advantage ; it will ensure to her almost the whole commerce 
of those countries. We can do without it, may be said by 
some ; so we can ; and we can do without houses, and live as 
the Indians did, in wigwams, but what is life worth in such 
a condition *? who would give up an advantage when it can 
be obtained without degradation *? what reasonable man 
will consent to relinquish the South American trade, if it can 
be procured by any reasonable means ? 

The object of the new states in forming a confederation is to 
prevent wars among themselves, and to acquire force enough 
to protect themselves from foreign violence. They would 
therefore not be averse to forming an alliance with a govern- 
ment which would not interfere with their domestic arrange- 
ments and institutions (and England would not interfere with 



172 

them in such a case, out of mere policy), which is able and 
willing to supply them with all the articles their commerce de- 
mands, from pins to ships of the line, which is strong enough to 
counterbalance alone any power with whom they may be at 
variance, and which, united with them, would be an over- 
match for any two powers of the world. Where should we 
be in such a contingency *? The gulf of Mexico girdled with 
islands in possession of a power always our rival, the mouth 
of it occupied by a strong post in her hands or under her in- 
fluence, for it no longer admits of a question that Cuba will 
within a very short time be in the hands of the Americans or 
of England, and thus the entrances into the gulf will be con- 
verted into a new Elsineure, rather larger it is true than the 
entrance into the Baltic, but quite as defensible by a strong 
naval power, and the whole of Hispano-America under the 
influence of the same rival, without redemption, Mexico on 
one of our frontiers, a weak one too, and the Canadas upon 
another. We should be hemmed in,. our frontiers open, our 
commerce lost, and we shall be the gibe, the derision, of the 
world. And for what *? Because we choose pertinaciously to 
adhere to an old saw. I do not call any thing that ever fell from 
the great man who entered his caveat against " entangling 
alliances," an old saw ; but I will give that epithet to the novel 
application and use of this sounding phrase. He never intend- 
ed to apply it to the present conjuncture, for it was not, and 
could not have been, within the scope of his views, when he 
used it ; he applied it to the position of affairs at the- time he 
wrote, when two belligerents contending for mutual exter- 
mination agitated the whole globe, had involved all civilized 
nations but ourselves in their contest, and threatened to sweep 
us into the vortex ; where there was danger that foreign in- 
fluence and the violent excitement of parties here would 
precipitate us into a war, foreign to our interests, alien to 
our institutions, upon the side of one or other of those go- 
vernments that v/ere grappling man to man and ship to ship 
on every battle field and on every ocean. The dictum was 
perfectly correct under the circumstances, and there were 
no indications that they would be changed during the lives of 
the present generation ; but it is not applicable to the ac- 



173 

tual condition of America ; nor could that great man have 
foreseen that the Spanish colonies would so soon have thrown 
off their vassalage to their metropolis, and started, Minerva 
like, armed and mailed, into existence, descending sword in 
hand into the arena of nations, to claim an equal and emi- 
nent position among the ancient sovereignties of the earth. 
He could not have conceived that all Europe would have 
formed an alliance, and marched the arriere ban of a conti- 
nent upon the colossal but splendid domination of one glo- 
rious man ; nor that this alliance should have survived the 
destruction of his power ; and still less that the manufacturers 
of England should have ostensibly abandoned, at this ex- 
act crisis, and when they can do it to their own benefit 
and to the detriment of every one else, the old principles of 
their navigation act, and their system of commercial restric- 
tion, attempting by a series of astute operations or intrigpes 
to bind the globe in ligaments of cotton twist. If he had 
foreseen these things, if he had anticipated the institution of 
an American system, and a grand American confederation, 
his truly American heart would have dictated an exception to 
the general rule he laid down against alliances ; a rule he 
only intended to apply to Europe, and which never was 
intended to be, and which never ought to have been, extend- 
ed to our own continent ; it might as well be pretended that 
the rule applies to the admission of new states into our con- 
federation. 

I must confess that I have none of the horror of alliances, 
which pro hac vice fills the breasts of some of my fellow 
citizens, but which did not fill them between the years '74 
and '84, nor between '93 and 1801, nor between 1811 and 
1815. The choice of the allies is a most important affair, 
and the repose of a nation depends upon its making a proper 
selection; but a nation at war without allies is exactly in the 
position of an individual in a quarrel without friends; either 
may be very right, very brave, very skilful, and all that sort 
of thing, nevertheless, with all the justice of the cause and 
ability to maintain it, he and it will be alike well beaten. 
It has been said that if we are at war we shall find no diffi- 
culty in getting allies ; so I have also heard that a man who 
X 



174 

is right in his quarrel will always be sure of finding suppof' 
ters; this is fine theory for fairy land, but I have yet to see 
it in real life for the individual, and I did not see it 1813 for 
our nation ; besides, if this argument be used, the principle 
of refusing alliances is given up. I am not in favour of alli- 
ances with the Ashantees, or with any other government with 
which we have no common interest, to involve us in wars 
with which we have nothing to do ; what I contend for is 
the propriety of an alliance with nations whose interests are 
interwoven with our own, and who will be dangerous 
neighbours unless we are allied with them. 

The old principle was promulgated during the excitement^ 
occasioned by the French revolution, and by the intrigues 
set on foot to induce us to take sides in the wars of that 
period, and intended to be applied to that conjuncture ; it is 
not applicable to the present state of things, nor to our own 
continent. As well might the arguments in favor of a navy 
be applied to the contingency of an invasion fiom Mexico; 
it is said that a navy is the most efficient and safest defence 
of this country — agreed, it is necessary in all contests with 
European governments; but of what use would a navy be if 
we were threatened with an attack from Mexico "? Could a 
fleet defend Arkansaw, or Missouri, or the long line of our 
back settlements, or the Mississippi, or Ohio, or Kentucky, 
or Pittsburg, or in short any part of the interior'? We are 
vulnerable there by Mexico; the rifle and the bayonet are 
the defence of the interior, where they would be well used. 
A great argument against alliances is that they would involve 
us in wars, whether we will or not : we refused alliances in 
Europe for twenty years, yet we were at last forced into a 
war, and this after they had the audacity to say that we 
could not be kicked into war — many a brave man paid the 
forfeit, and many a salvo of artillery, many a gleaming sabre, 
answered that insolent bravado. 

But my object is to avert war, by the American alliance. 
We cannot keep out of the conflict when there is a serious 
one on the Atlantic side of this continent. Again, it is said 
we must avoid war, which would endanger our institutions, 
&,c. &-C. Certainly we ought; and once more this is one great 



175 

isi^d of the American alliance : but we cannot keep out of 
wars, until all men are converted to justice, and inspired 
with similar pacific sentiments; that is until the golden age 
returns, of whose approach at this present writing there are 
no symptoms. We must be content to take mankind as they 
are, and all visionary dreams founded upon ideal and im- 
possible perfection of our sinful nature must be abandoned 
by those who love their country ; we cannot reform the world, 
and must therefore take proper precautions to prevent the 
evil passions of others from injuring ourselves; it would un- 
doubtedly be a most felicitous state of world if the lion and 
the lamb would lie down together, but as long as lions re- 
tain their appetites and lambs are good eating, the strong 
or the ambitious will attack or prey upon the weak and 
those who are likely to be overcome. I am not to defend 
the morality or the justice of those propensities ; but such 
has been, such is, the world, and whatever nation wilfully 
shuts its eyes to the lights of experience and to the actual 
state of human society, deserves all the consequences of its 
folly and imprudence. I am not discussing the condition 
of angels; I write for men, plain men. 

Indeed it is difficult to conceive that any nation can get 
along without alliances at various times. I do not pretend to 
discuss the word " entangling," which seems to be introduced 
euphonige gratia ; if it is not, the advocate of an alliance 
has only to say the particular instance he recommends is 
not entangling; but I meet the question on the broad 
ground. Nations will go to war, it is vain to reason about 
it, as long as men are men they will fight ; they have em- 
ployed themselves in that delectable amusement, in some 
quarter or other, for about six thousand recorded years; and, 
as I am not a believer in the mutability of our nature, I have 
no doubt that they will continue to diversify their history by 
the same entertainment ; if they can find no other reason 
for it, they will fight for the sake of fighting. When nations 
are at war, one of them at least will seek to strengthen itself 
by the aid of some power not previously engaged in the con- 
test, and will acquire that aid, if in no other way, by paying 
fortunes to the chief men, the rulers, of the nation whose 



176 

co-operation it desires : then the opposite party must resorl 
to alliances with some power which is disengaged, or must 
be beaten and overwhelmed. If our late war with England 
had continued, what would have been our condition without 
alliances 'I She had a much larger revenue than ourselves, 
and an army as well as a fleet manifold more numerous : we 
should unquestionably have fought bravely, but our sea bord 
towns would have been destroyed, if not held in possession 
by her ; she could not have conquered the country, nor re- 
colonized it, because at the worst we could have retreated 
to our mountains ; but nevertheless that worst would have 
been a deplorable misfortune : our self love may endeavour 
to disguise these truths, but they are truths. It is, among 
other things, to prevent the possibility of our ever being 
reduced to such extremities by any power, that I earnestly 
advocate the American confederation. The posture of 
affairs, in the winter of 1814 — 15, was equivalent to an 
alliance between us and France, it was nothing short of a 
diversion by her in our favour ; and whether this diversion 
was made in consequence of a written agreement between 
us and France, or in consequence of a peculiar contingency 
abroad, it amounted to the same effect. In order to satisfy 
the reader of the correctness of what is advanced, nothing 
more is necessary than to recall to his memory the history of 
the period, for in politics we can not hope to penetrate into 
the conclaves of cabinets, nor to have accurate details of 
their deliberations ; this is out of the question until all the 
actors upon the scene are passed off the stage, and then it 
is barely possible that their secret motives and their hidden 
resolutions may be developed ; we are therefore driven to 
draw our inferences from those facts and acts which have 
been performed before our eyes. 

When the offer of the mediation of Russia was made, she 
was in treaty with general Moreau : was there any connec- 
tion between these two things'? did the minister here wish to 
attract public attention to an object of major interest, so as 
to divert it from one which he had every reason to conceal '? 
did he wish to cover his communications upon this subject 
with the British forces in our waters under the veil of the 



177 

mediation ? Men are alive who can answer these questions, 
but they will not : for myself, I believe this transaction with 
Moreau to have been the real object of the negociation with 
admiral Warren, to cover which Mr DaschkofF offered the 
mediation : at the same time I must do him and his govern- 
ment the justice to aver my belief that, the mediation 
being offered, their conduct in it was perfectly loyal and 
honourable, and that Russia acted in it without connecting it 
in the least with any motive which might have prompted the 
original measure. However, we acceded to the proposal of 
the mediation although England did not, and sent ministers to 
Europe, who were moved from place to place for more than 
a year, before they could open a congress with the English 
commissioners. Meanwhile, Napoleon was overpowered ; his 
fall and the consequent peace with France afforded a suffi- 
cient reason for the indifference of England to peace, and 
for her procrastination of the negociations. But in the fall 
of 1814 she entered in good earnest into those negociations, 
and peace was announced on Christmas day in Ghent : in 
March 1815 Napoleon — the lion — broke his fetters and 
plunged into France; all Europe was put into motion upon 
a tremendous and very doubtful conflict. Here then is the 
secret cause why England made peace in December, at the 
very time when she had equipped a powerful force which 
was on its way to be defeated at New Orleans, an event she 
certainly did not expect or she would not have risked the 
expedition : she must have been well informed of the discon- 
tents and the symptoms of an approaching explosion in 
France, which we now know (although the public here were 
not apprised of it at the time, whatever might have been the 
secret intelligence of our government) had been in prepara- 
tion from midsummer of 1814. She saw therefore the great- 
est probability that all her battles on the continent would 
have to be fought over again, and in common prudence she 
was obliged to prepare for the contest by disengaging her- 
self of an active enemy, not knowing with any degree of 
certainty how many more she would have shortly to encoun- 
ter. Had not England been obliged by the state of Europe 
to make peace, what would have been our situation *? The 



1T8 

interest of her manufacturers and her merchants would hard- 
ly have induced it, because the markets of all Europe were 
open to them. We should have been compelled to seek alli- 
ances wherever we could have found them; and thus the 
necessity of the case would have forced us into an alliance, 
if we could have formed one, in spite of the maxim now so 
perpetually quoted; and moreover the universal approba- 
tion of the people would have sanctioned such a departure 
from the rule. 

What has happened may again occur; and we may again 
be placed in a situation which will equally require the abro- 
gation of the doctrine to " avoid entangling alliances;" it was 
adapted to a position of the world widely different from the 
present, and to the present it does not apply. Can any one 
in his sober senses believe that the rule ought to be observed 
jf England would now attempt to take possession of Cuba ?• 



CHAPTER XXI. 



HE singular series of reports which had come out at the 
time of my writing what was said in a former page upon the 
desire and the probability of an attempt of England to get 
possession of Cuba, has received strong confirmation since 
that page was written. England has most unexpectedly sent 
a strong body of troops to Portugal, to protect that country, 
as she says, against Spain. Now when did England ever 
engage in a war purely on behalf of another nation 9 Was 
Portugal in danger of conquest by Spain •? Not in the least ; 
Spain has enough to do to keep her own subjects quiet : and 
the immediate declared cause of the movement, even of the 
English guards, was that some Portuguese had gone into 
Spain, and, with her sanction, had returned to Portugal with 



179 

the project of opposing the constitution. Did any civilized 
nation ever go to war with another about a mere affair of 
police, a business for the provost marshal at worst, about a 
parcel of deserters ! The refutation of the pretence for these 
hostile demonstrations goes with it, appears upon the face of 
the thing, it is in itself an absurdity. But England is not in 
the habit of making such operations without deeper views. 
She will claim from Spain an indemnity for the expense of 
the movements, which she pretends have been made on ac- 
count of the hostile intentions towards Portugal that she 
attributes to Spain : and there are still her other claims upon 
Spain to be settled. Spain has no money, she can pay neither 
the one nor the others with cash ; and England will demand 
something else ; either the cession of Cuba, or possession of 
the island until her claims are defrayed out of the revenues 
— that is, till the day of judgment; for Spain has now nothing 
but Cuba and the Manillas left to assign or to mortgage ; and 
the latter would be a very incompetent fund to meet the 
amount England has already pretended to, without computing 
what she will ask for the Portuguese expedition. 

Report has succeeded report that England was about to 
take possession of the island. Every one knows that a sin- 
gle rumour may be raised to promote a speculation ; that it 
may be created by malice, caprice, or by visionary politi- 
cians. Isolated rumours are therefore received by the pru- 
dent with great caution : but when they are reiterated in 
various shapes, when they have universal currency, when 
they bear the aspect of a general accordance, when they 
agree with the evident politics or interest of a country, and 
when they are supported by manifest demonstrations or facts, 
they ought to be carefully examined by nations and govern- 
ments whose vital interests are likely to be affected by the 
measures they indicate. Long continued and consistent re- 
ports must have some kind of foundation, some real cause ; 
they are like the deep groaning of the earth which precedes 
and announces the approaching earthquake — like the hollow 
moan of the winds, the precursor of the coming storm. With 
respect to the designs on Cuba, the rumours have had every 
characteristic which entitles them to the gravest considera- 



180 

tion of this country and of America at large : they have not 
only been long continued, universal, and consistent, but they 
have also been, and are, supported by the palpable inte- 
rest, the politics, and the measures of England. Is further 
proof wanted that England aims at interfering with Cuba? 
Mr Canning has declared, in the insolent speech which has 
destroyed his reputation as a statesman — which contains 
expressions equivalent to tweaking the nose of every sove- 
reign of Europe and of every chief of the executive branch 
elsewhere — in that tirade he declared that his object had 
been from the moment the French armies entered Spain, to 
use all the means he possessed as minister of a great power, 
to effect a separation between Spain and her cidevant colo- 
nies. The possession of this island will complete the line 
of circumvallation, so to express it, the chain of posts, she 
has been occupied in tracing and establishing in the West 
Indies. A simple inspection of the map will shew the value 
of this line to her, and its fatal effect upon us, in every 
point of view. It will give to her immense marine a surveil- 
lance over every rag of canvas that is spread between 
Charleston and Trinidad, and over the whole commerce of 
the Caribbean sea and the gulf of Mexico : it will give her 
the master key to the gulf, and plant her sentinels in the 
gorge of the real Atlantic mouths of the Mississippi ; it will 
place her, the nation which employs black troops in the is- 
lands, within arm's length of the inflammable materials of our 
southern frontiers ; and we have had in two w^ars sufficient 
specimens of her disposition to avail herself of any advanta- 
ges which may be afforded by the nature of those materials. 
If we are not put upon our guard by the rumours which 
have been alluded to, we shall have no other warning. She 
will negociate for the cession or the hypothecation of the 
island in the recesses of the Escurial, if it is conceded to her 
by way of indemnity, for the expense of the Portuguese busi- 
ness or for satisfaction of the Spanish debt ; and if she does 
not acquire it by treaty, the first news we shall receive of the 
overt act will be the mooring of a fleet in the Havannah; we 
shall not be warned, as in ordinary cases, by the activity of 
her dockyards and the movement of troops to the ports. 



181 

because there will be a sufficient excuse for them given by the 
expedition of fresh troops to Portugal. If the report current 
at the moment I write this that five sail of the line and three 
frigates are ordered to tl)e West Indias, to reinforce her 
squadrons already there, we need no other warning ; if this 
be not enough for us, we must be blind indeed. 

But if we had not these indications before us, her whole 
history shews that she is somewhat given to anticipate mat- 
ters a little in the business of treating ; witness her exploit at 
Copenhagen, her very summary conduct in the affair of the 
armed coalition, and her attack upon New Orleans at the 
moment when she was in the act of concluding a treaty of 
peace ; to say nothing of her custom of sweeping the seas by 
her letters of marque and reprisal, as well as by her regular 
ships of war, before issuing her declarations of war. When 
we have before our eyes these reiterated instances of her 
habit of striking before crying gare, and of her trifling ab- 
errations from the received law of nations, and when we 
have the loud voice of fame ringing precautionary counsel 
into our ears, we shall have none but ourselves to blame if 
our supine indifference is next disturbed by the intelligence 
that the haughty cross of St George floats upon the tropical 
winds over the battlements of the Moro. And then ! — Why 
then the mischief will be done — and we shall growl, and ne- 
gociate, and fight perhaps. But the precious time will have 
slipt away — illabitur irreparabile tempus — when we might 
have guarded against the evil, and probably prevented the 
effusion of blood, by uniting ourselves with the rest of Amer- 
ica, creating a strength which could not be disregarded, and 
announcing the determination of a continent in the thunder 
of the concentrated voiceis of all the fraternity of the allied 
nations — of thirty millions of souls. 

If there were no other reasons for the confederation, they 
are found in the necessity to us that no strong naval power, 
always jealous, if not inimical to us, shall ever possess the 
key to the vast west and to the immeasurable resources of 
both the American continents. 

If we do not interfere to prevent the capture or possession 
of Cuba, and we are hardly able to do it alone, South Ame- 
Y 



^182 

rica and Mexico cannot prevent it; they are not strong 
enough, and have no fleet: what ships they have, united to 
ours, will be formidable ; but the navies of either North or 
South America alone are not competent to oppose that of 
Great Britain : this is the fact; all the world knows it ; and it 
would be worse than folly to attempt to disguise or conceal 
it from ourselves : a writer must have a very low opinion of 
the intelligence of his€X)untrymen, who could descend to the 
servile adulation of attempting to pamper their self love, at 
the risk of enervating their decision upon a topic pregnant 
with the most important results : the writer of this sheet has 
not such an opinion of his fellow citizens, and his feeble pen 
shall never be exerted in an attempt to deceive them. We 
may go to war to liberate Cuba from the dominion of a naval 
power whose presence at the debouche of the Mexican gulf 
in no wise accords with our convenience, our interests, nor 
our honour ; but it is vain to fancy that we alone shall be 
able to wrest it from that power whose possession of the 
island is the most to be deprecated by us. We must call in 
the aid of other nations interested, like ourselves, in the in- 
violability of Cuba in the hands of its present owners, or in 
its affixation to the American system. Who shall be, what 
ought to be, that power, these nations "? 1 answer decidedly, 
the rest of America. 

France is also interested in protecting the island from 
England ; first to preserve it for a member of the house of 
Bourbon ; but if this can not be, then to sanction its occupa- 
tion by the powers of America, or its emancipation, and 
its establishment as a separate nation, when it must be 
guarantied by some other powerful governments in order to 
give it a security that its own strength is inadequate to af- 
ford : France is interested in one or other of these courses, 
because if England should get possession of Cuba, the 
commerce of the island, of the Caribbean coast of Colombia, 
and of the gulf of Mexico, will be lost to the residue of Eu- 
rope, and will be monopolized by England, and because 
such a monopoly will tend to double the resources and 
the naval power of a nation already much stronger than 
is consistent with the interest and politics of continental 



183 

Europe. The same reasons must actuate the other cabinets 
of Europe ; they can not, in common prudence, look with 
indifference upon the destiny of Cuba; they are all of them 
more or less concerned in the present commerce of the 
countries, the direction of whose trade depends upon the 
solution of the pending question ; and they can not but be 
aware that this trade is about to become the most important 
object of mercantile enterprise. It follows, of mere politi- 
cal necessity, that all continental Europe must view with 
favourable eyes whatever measures America may adopt to 
preserve Cuba from a fate which will be to the injury of 
them all The question then occurs, whether the European 
powers will not make common cause, and interdict the occu- 
pation of the island to England ; and whether they will not 
equally oppose its occupation by America. As to the first, I 
do not think that Europe will, unless the impulse is given else- 
where, risk the very probable excitement of another general 
war ; as to the second, my Opinion is that Europeans must be 
sensible that America can not desire any extension of terri- 
tory ; they must know that we have, and that we are aware we 
have, already territory enough in all conscience, more than 
we know what to do with, and more than we can fill with 
our population, for many generations to come : of course 
attributing to us only moderate perceptions of our true in- 
terests, they must conclude it is not from any ambitious de- 
signs that we desire to substitute ourselves, I mean America 
at large not any particular nation, in place of the actual 
owner, in case that owner is to lose the island. They must 
know that if Spain is strong enough to maintain her posses- 
sion, will keep it, and will make peace with the late colo- 
nies, instead of using the ports of Cuba and the force sta- 
tioned there as a means of annoyance to them, then it can 
not be an object with America to deprive her of it. They 
will know finally that if America does take possession of the 
island, it will be the consequence of dire necessity, an act 
of pure self defence, in order to secure our own commerce 
and safety, and to afford facilities to the trade of the rest of 
the world, that it will be as much for the benefit of the world 
at large as for our own advantage j and hence it results that 



184 

Europe will not be adverse to such an enterprise upon our 
part, if it does not take sides with us ; and that it will adopt 
the latter measure is a very probable supposition. 

If these positions are correct, continental Europe may be 
induced even to favour the formation of an American con- 
federation, in order to bear directly upon the immunity of 
Cuba from England, as well as to create a power to keep her 
otherwise in check ; this suggestion has already been made. 

Should the vast design be effected of connecting the Atlan- 
tic and Pacific oceans by means of a canal adapted to sea ves- 
sels, across the isthmus which unites the two Americas, the 
importance of preventing the occupation of the post at the 
mouth ofthegulfby one grasping commercial and naval power 
will be enormously increased. Every nation on the surface 
of the globe will be interested in keeping free the access 
to and egress from this canal, which will be the high way, 
not only for the commerce of all the Pacific coasts of North 
and of South America, as well as of the islands of that ocean, 
but also for the trade with all the East Indies, China inclu- 
ded, and even with Asiatic Kamschatchka: the future extent 
of the value of this commerce can only be pictured by the 
most brilliant imagination : all the world partakes in it di- 
rectly or indirectly ; and of course the whole world is interes- 
ted in keeping its adit clear. The protection of the canal 
itself, and of the commerce which will pass through it, is 
another great inducement to the confederation : these are 
objects of too great importance to be entrusted to any single 
government; the canal will become an extension of the ocean, 
a new highway of nations ; and the welfare of mankind will 
demand that it shall be a safe, secure, and peaceable one. 
Europe is too distant to afford this security, to guaranty this 
peace ; and no one of the American nations will be strong 
enough in an age to protect it. It must therefore be confi- 
ded to the united strength of America ; and without such 
an union, or such a safeguard, the greatest improvement of 
modern times will become comparatively useless to the 
commerce of all mankind, who are alike concerned in its re- 
sults. The first and most indispensable requisite to the utility 
of the canal is that Cuba shall not be in the hands of a na- 



185 

tion already oppressing, taxing, the earth with its commerce, 
and so powerful in its naval force as to interfere with the se- 
curity of the rest of the human race. 

It may be said that England will not venture to awaken 
the hostility of the rest of Europe as well as of America by 
seizing Cuba. But she has risked this hostility for less ob- 
jects : did she not keep Malta after the peace of Amiens at a 
like risk, and did she not persevere in keeping it when 
Europe was actually roused by this among other reasons to 
a general war against her; does she not hold it at this hour *? 
Is not her seizure of the cape of Good Hope another example 9 
Gibraltar another"? Her late attempt to establish, and her 
actual enforcement of, the rule of the war of 1756, yet ano- 
ther"? These during wars it is true; but they were not less 
violent aggressions upon the rights of particular nations, 
and upon the commercial convenience of all : yet she dared 
them. And as to Cuba, its possession is vastly more impor- 
tant than either of the other points to the advancement of 
those views which led her to seize Gibraltar and the Cape. 
She is bold enough to attempt the seizure of Cuba with the 
same views, and she is strong enough to effectuate the at- 
tempt, if she is not prevented by the presence or the vicinity 
of a powerful force. I believe she will make the attempt im- 
mediately, and that the dispute in Portugal will serve as the 
pretext, or will answer for the cover ; but if she does not now 
make it, the design will only be postponed to a more conve- 
nient opportunity ; she will never lose sight of it, she will 
endeavour sooner or later to make herself mistress of the 
island, and she will succeed in the endeavour, unless the 
American confederation is formed. The adoption therefore 
of a decided and effectual measure to guard this invaluable 
post ought not to be procrastinated, unnecessarily, one hour, 
and the guard ought to be perpetual and vigilant. No other 
than the confederation will be adequate to the object : always 
near, and always strong enough to interfere with effect, the 
confederation can and will protect the island. If we trust 
to the intervention of any European power, we might as 
well reconcile ourselves at once to the extension of the En- 
glish acts of parliament, and her orders in council, over the 



186 

American seas ; we had better immediately begin to famil- 
iarize ourselves with the idea of her monopoly of the West 
Indias. Europe is too far removed from the scene of action, 
and England may almost when she pleases be in possession 
of the island which will give her that monopoly in effect, 
and which will render her mistress of these seas, before 
her continental neighbours are ready to contest the matter 
with her. But an American confederation is as it were upon 
the spot or can arrive in time to forestal her. It is in vain 
to talk of the laws of nations; cannon are the promulgators 
of the laws of nations, and power is the only law which ob- 
tains among them. Binkershook, Grotius, and Vattel are 
fine text books whence to extract the data for able or long 
official letters, and they afford materials for excellent re- 
crimination; but no man who has lived through the last thirty 
years and has witnessed the proceedings of all the great 
parties which have figured in the history of the times, even 
if he do not turn back to the anterior precedents, can place 
reliance upon expectations of the obedience of nations to 
any law but that of present expediency; much less can he 
expect England to abide by those written codes. Nor will 
England be deterred by fear of exciting a war in Europe by 
a seizure of Cuba, if she is ready for a war ; we have seen 
over and over again that she does not mind war, and that 
apprehension of it does not stop her from pursuing what she 
thinks her interest ; the only thing that seems to induce her 
to pause is the calculation of the relative advantage of a 
design compared with the cost of a war, and even this weighs 
but lightly with her. I could accumulate instances to prove 
the position, but they are familiar to every one who is inti- 
mate with her history : does she not even at this instant 
hazard a war of extermination rather than admit the vast 
majority of the inhabitants of Ireland to a participation in 
the rights which she declares in the abstract to belong to 
all mankind, and does she not refuse that participation upon 
a pretence belonging to the oldest and darkest periods of 
monkish infatuation, at variance with the illumination and 
the spirit of the age we live in"? England is therefore not 
to be trusted, the influence of the laws of nations upon her is 



187 

not to be relied upon, unless she is guarded against, unless 
they are guarantied by the actual presence of power to re- 
strain her and to enforce them. Besides, if she is at war 
with Spain the mere letter of the law of nations will autho- 
rize her to capture a Spanish colony; if she make a treaty 
with Spain the mere letter of the law will sanction her re- 
ceiving a cession of the island; however repugnant such a 
capture or such a cession may be to the interests of the rest 
of the world. The fact is that the spirit of the law, well 
understood, is the preservation of the rights, interests, and 
convenience of all the nations of the globe : but when a na- 
tion keeps within the limits of the lex scripta, violations of 
the spirit of the law, acts which militate against the conve- 
nience and interest of others, are cause of war, whose only 
restraints are the probability of success, and the incident 
cost of a war in blood and treasure. Spain is exasperated 
to the last degree against her late colonies, and if she finds 
that she can not keep Cuba, she will be very much disposed 
to cede it to a nation whose presence there will be the most 
injurious to their future destinies. Not but that she is aware 
of the grasping disposition of England, as is proved by the 
late memoir of the archbishop of Toledo, if it be genuine, 
or she will be made so by that paper, if it has been fabri- 
cated in another country : it either shews a spirit of great 
distrust, if it be truly a Spanish state paper, or it appeals so 
directly to the temper, the prejudices, and the superstition 
of the Spanish people, that it will excite that distrust. But 
nevertheless it is very likely that Spain will sacrifice the 
island to get rid of her debt, in spite of her feeling towards 
England, or if she perseveres in opposing the British pre- 
tensions, it will be captured from her, unless other powers 
interfere, not only by negociations but by actual force, to 
prevent such an event. We can not be certain that the 
European powers will interfere, and in common prudence 
we must do so: the proverb is too old to be disputed, that 
" what one does one's self is well and actually done, but there 
is no reliance upon the execution of what is left for others 
to do." 

It may be urged that the interest of Spain is so direct to^ 



188 

retain Cuba that she will not relinquish it to any power. 
But I have more than once repeated that I believe the pas- 
sions of men govern them more than their interest; and 
hence I infer that Spain will be apt to cede the island to the 
power whose possession of it will be most inconvenient to 
her late colonies : her interest will also not be silent, be- 
cause she owes a large debt to England which she has no 
means of paying, except by abandoning to her an island 
which she has no chance of preserving to herself. It is in 
vain to disguise this fact; Spain will not be allowed by her 
cidevant colonies to preserve Cuba. The ports of that island 
afford her too many facilities for invadmg or for otherwise 
annoying the new states ; and although it would be more for 
the advantage of these states that Spain should continue her 
ownership, than that any other of the greater powers of Eu- 
rope should supply her place, provided she had cordially 
and frankly acknowledged an independence against which 
she contends in vain, yet it is now too late to counteract the 
deep impression left upon the Americans by her conduct dur- 
ing the war, which has left a rancorous feeling not to be 
expiated for a generation, and which will lead them to at- 
tack her wherever they can reach her; the same rancour 
they know exists on her side, and will induce her to main- 
tain a series of hostile operations against them, even after 
making peace, from a place that affords her such tempting 
opportunities. The new states will therefore take posses- 
sion of Cuba; they can and they will unless anticipated by 
England ; not from ambitious views of extending their pos- 
sessions, but on the naked principle of self defence. Spain 
must be aware of this, and will on that account be the less 
reluctant to abandon it to England, if they treat; and if the 
present disturbance between the two countries continue, as 
has been before said, England will capture the island. It 
is to be remarked that in speaking here of Cuba, I consider 
that Porto Rico will follow its destiny as being a mere ap- 
pendage. 

The minister of internal and foreign relations of Mexico 
thinks that the large and expensive expeditions of Spain to 



189 

Cuba are proofs of her having had recourse to and the aid 
of foreign assistance. See his report of 9th January 1826. 
He seems to allude to France, as that foreign power ; and it 
appears to me very possible that he may be correct; but not 
in the inference he draws of unfriendliness to South Ameri- 
ca; this would be too blinded a policy to be adopted by so 
intelligent a government; if France did assist Spain informmg 
these expeditions, it must have been with intention of securing 
the island from England : thus the supposition of the minis- 
ter confirms my positions. 

Among the various rumours which always are floating in 
the political atmosphere is one that England and the United 
States have since a considerable time concluded a secret 
treaty stipulating that neither will take possession of Cuba. 
I do not believe that such a treaty exists : to be sure, there 
is no penetrating the fire proofs of the secretary of state's 
oflUce, but I cannot conceive that the executive would venture, 
as parties stand, to enter into an understanding of the sort, or 
of any other kind, however beneficial to the country, without 
the advice of the senate; it could not be a treaty or an obli- 
gation on part of this country, without such consent : and 
on the other hand, if such a treaty had been made, the public 
would have heard of it pretty decisively in some way or 
other : nor is any reason apparent why such a treaty, or obli- 
gation, or understanding, should be kept secret; for it would 
be very satisfactory to us to know that such was actually the 
state of things, and it would not be for the advantage of 
England to conceal it; in as much as it would obviate in 
Europe many of the suspicions and imputations upon the 
devouring propensity of her ambition ; it would even refute 
part of the arguments of Don Pedro Inguanzo's memoir to 
the king of Spain. But supposing such an understanding 
did exist, the precaution of making sure of compliance with 
stipulations would not be misplaced; for deviation from 
which there are such temptations, and such plausible ex- 
cuses as the satisfaction by Spain of the English debt, or the 
liability of the island to capture as the colony of an enemy, 
in case the present disturbances should degenerate into 
decided war. 
Z 



190 

Probably no condition of Cuba would be as well for the 
United States as its remaining under the dominion of Spain ; 
remaining permanently, not in such a predicament as to keep 
us in constant alarm and anxiety on the subject. And if she 
would or could make an honest, cordial, peace with her late 
colonies, abandoning sincerely all ideas of impossible con- 
quest, or of disturbing their tranquillity and of wasting her 
own blood and treasure, whether in mere revenge for what 
has passed, or in idle attempts to regain what she has lost, in 
fruitless attempts to arrest the irresistible march of nations 
towards the accomplishment of their destinies, in contestation 
against the decrees of fate which have received the nutus, 
and have been sworn to by Styx — if she would or could be 
reconciled to her oiSspring, the young eagles which have 
quitted with adult wings the parental eyrie, then her con- 
tinued possession of Cuba, her only remaining important 
colony, would be possibly as advantageous to the South 
American and Mexican states as the annexation of the island 
to the American system, by affiliating it to the great Ameri- 
can family. Cuba cannot, with safety to us, be adopted into 
the government of either Mexico or Colombia, unless with 
a qualification, which those nations, or at least Colombia, 
wouW probably be averse to admitting, after their unequi- 
vocal declarations against slavery. It would not do for us 
to have the condition changed of a population composed of 
so many slaves and of so many free blacks or mulattoes, 
within a summer day's sail of our southern frontier : as long 
as Spain holds the island, the actual condition of that popu- 
lation will not be changed. Spain will never under any cir- 
cumstances be a naval power formidable to America; our 
fleets, or those of the southern nations, will always be either 
of them an overmatch for hers : but she will be sufficiently 
strong, when she is regenerated, retaining Cuba, to make 
herself respectable, and to preserve the island from foreign 
violence as well as intestine commotion long enough to give 
time for the other nations who have common interest in it 
to arrive with succours, and to bear a proportionate share in 
preserving the inviolability of the Mexican gulf, which would, 
in such a state of things, be as much her interest as that of 



191 

America. If this posture of affairs were attainable, it would 
not be for the interest of the, United States to disturb it; 
because it would not interfere with the condition of the 
slave holding states, and because it is hardly possible that 
under any other circumstances we could have a larger pro- 
portion than at present of the commerce of the island, beyond 
what would be the result of the increase of its population 
and weallh. 

But I must confess that I do not see how it is possible 
for the island to continue in its present state, when the pro- 
verbial pertinacity of the Spanish character is taken into 
consideration, together with the determination of the new 
states to drive her from her last position of annoyance, and 
with the interest as well as the disposition which I at least 
attribute to England upon the subject of Cuba. I therefore 
infer that there is nothing in the problematical or contingent 
future condition of Cuba which affords the slightest argument 
against the necessity of the American confederation ; but on 
the contrary, that every sound political anticipation upon the 
fate of the island, and all its actual as well as its probable fu- 
ture condition, together with every branch and filament of its 
concerns or relations, and their influence upon the repose, 
the interest, and the convenience of America, afford argu- 
ments, not to be refuted, to demonstrate the vital necessity of 
?;he confederation. 



1^2 



CHAPTER XXII. 



I i F.T it be permitted to descend from considerations of 
general and expansive concern to one of a more contracted 
and individual scope. What will be the effect upon the 
executive of the United States of its adoption of the views 
here endeavoured to be sustained 9 The objection that such 
consideration is an intrenchment on the right of individ- 
uals to judge for themselves upon all matters of their own 
concern, cannot hold good in this country, whatever might 
be the case in a monarchy ; here the administration is the 
organ for execution of the people's will; its acts are the 
deeds of the people, and its impulses therefore are mat- 
ters of public concern ; and, without presuming to dictate, 
vi'hich no individual has a right to do, it is the prerogative 
of every citizen respectfully and decorously to submit to 
those in authority, and to his fellow citizens, his humble 
opinions upon the expediency of measures which are to atiect 
the commonwealth. 

The administration has been censured by some persons 
for every step it has taken in reference to the subject pro- 
posed to it by the South Americans and Mexicans. This 
memoir has nothing to do with the question between the ins 
and the outs ; it is intended neither to support nor to assail 
the administration ; it is general in its views upon a ge- 
neral and national subject ; but the writer cannot understand 
the propriety or expediency of setting fire to one's own house 
in order to drive out a resident one does not like, or of op- 
posing a measure of national interest in order to thwart an 



193 

administration which one desires to remove ; it appears to him 
that every man's regard for his own interest, which is of 
necessity involved in that of the nation at large, should lead 
him to wish the government and the country to prosper, con- 
duct it who may, or let whoever will be at its head. With 
respect to the question of the confederation, if the people 
are in favour of the course advocated by these pages, the 
point is decided ; and it is in order to convince the people, 
whether in favour of the administration or not, of the expe- 
diency of adopting the American system, that I have hitherto 
argued. But now let a few remarks be devoted to its im- 
mediate effect upon whose opposition to, or recommendation 
of, the design must have considerable operation upon public 
sentiment. 

The design of confederating in grand alliance the whole 
of a vast continent, is one of unrivalled magnificence, and 
will be celebrated in history among the most distinguished 
of recorded events: those men therefore who are at the 
head of a government and who co-operate in the estab- 
lishment of so splendid a system, will have their names en- 
rolled upon the list of the benefactors of mankind, to be 
handed down to an admiring posterity. A design somewhat 
similar to this, but upon a more contracted scale, although 
unsuccessful, has been a cause of panegyric, for two cen- 
turies, upon the good Henry IV. and his great Sully. Can 
any man be insensible to the desire of placing his name 
beside theirs, nay above them, by actually executing upon 
a broader basis, the project which has illustrated the 
names of Henry and Rosny "? Can any man be deaf to the 
call of glory, which appeals to him from the midst of the 
clouds of futurity to attempt an immortalizing action 9 The 
future renown, the glory, and the present admiration, which 
the executive would acquire by attempting, and much more 
by succeeding in the attempt, to unite all America in a confe- 
deration, are of themselves sufficient inducements, adequate 
incentives, to the undertaking. The fame of conquest is 
common ; the celebrity of legislation is partaken by many ; 
the reputation of constructing monuments, edifices, and im- 
provements, decorates the memories of most great men ; but 



194 

the pacific agglomeration of nine nations, of thirty millions 
of souls — the beneficent conciliation of a whole continent, 
and its union for the purpose of maintaining peace and pro- 
moting wealth and prosperity among all its inhabitants, of 
repressing among foreigners even the idea of disturbing the 
tranquillity of its happy shores — the glory of such designs, 
is unique in the annals of the earth, and will stand alone to 
eternity, for never again can the great families of the hu- 
man race be placed in a crisis which will enable a similar 
splendid undertaking to be realized : proportionable to its 
singularity and to its magnitude will be the gratitude, the 
admiration, of the world to the founders of the new epoch in 
the history of mankind. There may be suggested a question 
of the present effect upon the personal popularity of the 
members of the administration if it adopt the project and 
recommend it to the nation. The first answer is, that what- 
ever may be the present effect, the admiration of all men 
will be the future reward of such a course : the second is 
that I cannot think so basely of any men who have been 
thought worthy by a majority of the people of the Uni- 
ted States to fill their highest offices, as to believe them ca- 
pable of hesitating from so vile a motive, if they are con- 
vinced of the expediency and propriety of the measure ; and, 
thinking as I do of the confederation, I am sure that, after 
the existing discrepancies of party shall have sunk into the 
oblivion which is the fate of all party excitements, the good 
sense of the people will visit redoubled indignation upon the 
heads of those, who, being satisfied of the advantage of the 
confederation to them and to the world at large, should dare 
to palter with their interests, under an apprehension of a 
temporary risk of popularity or of a loss of offices. No man 
was ever great but by connecting himself with a great cause ; 
nor did ever man obtain renown but by hazarding, by dar- 
ing, to act : the event of all actions is hidden in shadows of 
futurity ; but he who feared those shadows, and stood tremb- 
ling upon their verge, has gone to his forgotten grave, un- 
known, unnoticed, to join the herd of vulgar spirits, who 
have lived, eaten, and died, after an existence monotonous 
to themselves, and without note, consequence, or advantage, 



195 

to their country. It may be that my impressions with re- 
gard to the confederation are wrong ; but if they are wrong 
I glory in the error of Henry, Sully, and Bolivar. If I am 
light, and I believe myself to be so, I am certain that my 
countrymen, when they have had time to examine the sub- 
ject, when they have disengaged it from party excitement, 
with which it has been attempted to be united, when they 
have reflected upon it, will be almost unanimously in favour 
of the confederation. If they become so, and if the ad- 
ministration shall have thrown its weight into the scale, it is 
not necessary to indicate the consequences to them. I will 
be still more specific — the confederation is an object wor- 
thy of the support of that individual who year after year ex- 
horted the congress of the United States to recognize the 
independence of Spanish America : if the cause shall be es- 
poused by him, and if he shall succeed in convincing the 
representatives of the people in this point too, it will have 
the etfect of securing those who are attached, and of conci- 
liating many who are opposed, to him, while the masculine 
vigour of such a line of conduct must gain him the respect 
of all men. 

All that can be said, has been said against the members 
of the administration, for what has been done in respect to 
this question ; it would have been better for them to have 
gone the whole length ; they would not have been more cen- 
sured and they would have staked their popularity upon a 
magnificent die. It is not yet too late, they may yet signify 
to the congress of Tacubaya their desire of protracting the 
definitive determination upon the subject until a positive 
decision is had on it by the next congress j and the South 
Americans will wait for it. 

In thus treating on the probable effect upon the existing 
administration, of adopting the system proposed, the writer 
is not taking side either for it or against it ; the union of this 
nation with the rest of America is what he has in view, and 
to support this measure his humble exertions are devoted, 
be the negociations conducted by whom they may : it is a 
national cause, and he cannot confound it with party, nor 
with preference by any part of the community of individuals 
for office : he holds the maxim of the gallant Decatur, " our 



196 



country, right or wrong, still our country ;" but he holds no 
less steadfastly another, "our country, rule who may, still our 
country.'- 



CHAPTER XXIIl. 



I 



T has been attempted to sketch with a flowing outline so 
much of the politics of Europe as appear to the writer to 
be connected with, or to bear upon, the discussion of the 
grand subject of this memoir. It has been essayed to deli- 
neate in a rapid portraiture the most striking features of the 
Mexican and South American politics, statistics, and actual 
situation, in order to prove that^the new nations are in a con- 
dition to form a durable and formidable alliance among 
themselves, with us, or with whom they please ; that their 
governments are sufficiently established, and characterized 
with the attributes of permanency, for that or any other pur- 
pose ; that their peculiar situation and relations in respect to 
one another, to us, and to the world, and above all that the pe- 
culiar nature of their populations, require the establishment 
of a confederation upon the system proposed, for the sake of 
their own tranquillity, welfare, and interest, for those of the 
United States, and for those of all civilization. It has been 
attempted to be shewn that the position of the West Indian 
islands, especially Cuba, with respect to us, to the rest of 
America, and to Europe, demand of this continent the mea- 
sure here advocated. It has been attempted to demonstrate 
to America and to Europe that the policy, the ravenous 
commercial spirit, the ambition, and the character of Eng- 
land, tend to renew, in our days, and in her domination, the 
decree which went forth from Caesar that all the world 
should be taxed -, and therefore that a grand confederation 



197 

©f America is necessary to repel that nation within the 
bounds prescribed alike by the safety, the prosperity, and 
the interest, of these United States, of the other American 
nations, and of the world. The arguments are addressed 
equally to the United States and South America and Mexico. 

The consideration of the English policy has occupied a 
large portion of the preceding pages ; this has been occa- 
sioned by my impression of the dangerous tendency of the 
plans she is, and has long been, pursuing, and by my belief that 
her system savours, more than any previously formed project, 
of a design, an aim, at universal empire, a predominating 
sovereignty of the most offensive nature — the sovereignty of 
her shops — a cotton kingdom. The subject has been dwelt 
upon because 1 conceive that England is the power chiefly 
to be guarded against, and that her plans are the most dele- 
terious to the welfare of America, the most dangerous to our 
institutions, and most calculated to disturb the repose of a 
population unfortunately composed of different races, one of 
which occupies a situation in society that she does not hesi- 
tate to attempt changing. 

It has been finally attempted to be shewn that the people 
of the United States, and their public servants, are called 
upon by every motive of policy to unite with the rest of 
America in forming a general alliance and confederacy, to 
preserve peace and harmony among themselves, to avert the 
possibility of foreign wars, to insure the prevalence of our 
political institutions, to secure domestic tranquillity, to bind 
the continent together in the bonds of fraternal affection, to 
concentrate among themselves the advantages and profits of 
their rich and unbounded commerce, and last in the enume- 
ration, but first in all generous hearts, for the gloky of 
America. 



2 A 



198 



CHAPTER XXIV. 



Ti 



HE details of a treaty of confederation do not belong 
to the plan of this memoir ; the establishment of the principle 
is what it has in view. But the general outline should be, 
A strict alliance, guarantying to each party the integrity of 
its possessions ; A central congress, which is to determine 
disputes which may arise between any of the parties, oi be- 
tween them and foreign governments: A prohibition of war 
between any of the parties, and between any individual 
party and a foreign government ; War if necessary to be waged 
by the confederation, which alone is to have power to make 
peace ; Contingents of land and sea forces and funds of trea- 
sure to be supplied by the parties, and placed at the disposal 
of the confederation, powerful enough to enforce compliance 
with the general will ; Among the powers of the congress of 
the confederation to be the authority for digesting a code of 
national law; The functions of the confederation to be limited 
to the authority conceded to it, not to extend to the domes- 
tic or interior government of the several parties, its object 
being only to preserve peace within and between the states, 
and with foreign nations, by bringing the whole power of the 
continent to bear upon those who attempt its interruption. 

For such a plan of confederation, for any general confed- 
eration, the present is the only opportunity we shall ever 
have : there are now no antipathies between the American 
nations, no enmities* ; these will speedily arise if we are not 



Except between Brazil and Buenos Ayres. 



199 

in alliance, and then confederation is impossible ; alliances 
may be made, but they will be made here as they are all over 
the world — to be broken. If such a treaty of confederation 
be not now in agitation at Tacubaya, it ought to be proposed 
by us ; and if the sanction of congress be wanted for so 
decisive and distinguished a design, it ought to be suggested 
to the congress of Tacubaya that it will be proposed next 
winter, and no doubt the result of the deliberations of our 
legislature will be readily and eagerly awaited. 



JL HAVE done. The sentiments expressed in these pages 
are illy written: I can not help it : the subject is too magni- 
ficent, too engrossing, to permit the choice of words or the 
parsing of sentences while the mind is enveloped in such a 
theme, a theme pregnant with the destiny of nations, with 
the fate of the world. The pen which has been used is an 
iron one, I know, but 1 have neither time nor patience for 
phraseology, nor do the topics treated of allow, condescend 
to, measured and melodious periods. 

" 1 too am a Roman citizen," and, as a free and equal par- 
ticipator in the privileges and immunities guarantied by the 
laws and the constitution, I have, equally with every other 
citizen, an absolute and indefeasible right to promulgate opi- 
nions upon all subjects of political import. I blame none 
for disagreeing with me, and I claim an equal indulgence. 
My hopes and my prospects depend on the welfare of our 
country, and are inseparably involved with those of my fel- 
low citizens, not one of them would be more deeply affected 
in feeling by her reverses. 



200 

1 have felt an irresistible impulse to raise my feeble 
voice, and to declare my individual vote, with the reasons 
which convince me of its correctness, in support of a mea- 
sure for which our major interests appear to me to cry aloud. 
It is in the execution of the task that I have failed to satisfy 
myself. 

Political dogmas have been opposed, and personal pre- 
judices have been encountered, directly, unequivocally ; not 
ignorant that I did so, nor unaware of the consequences in 
this country in case of failure in producing conviction ; but 
they have been encountered under a grave impression of the 
tremendous consequences which await us and our future ge- 
nerations upon the determination of the grand crisis now in 
action — those prejudices have been encountered, and those 
consequences to myself and to my interests have been risked, 
and if it please God, I will encounter and risk them upon 
this and upon every occasion, when I conceive the welfare, 
the honour, the interest, or the prosperity of my country at 
stake. To determine the question rests with the people at 
large, and to them I appeal — I put myself upon the country. 



THE END. 



JAMES KAYj 3VN. PRINTEE. 




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